We [Arabs] have been in Africa for 1200 years, and yet we still behave as colonialists.
--Mohammed Ahmed Ben BellaMy POC-Understanding-Each-Other Award goes the above speaker, a former President of Algeria. It also goes out to any Arab who is also willing to speak thusly, because this ridiculous claim Egyptian Arabs are trying to make on Ancient Kemet is a fail of epic proportions--amongst other epic fails. Ancient Kemet preceeds the Arab conquest of Egypt literally by thousands of years.
Fuck...any undergraduate history major who stays awake for five minutes in class can tell you that.
And this will come as a shock to all you typical Western folk who don't take the time out to do any real research (or don't wonder why an in-depth tour of Egypt is often "discouraged" by the Egyptian government), 94% of present-day Egypt is "ethnic Egyptian", not Arab--74 million people out of 81.3 million, by the way. Guess what the fuck they look like.
Notice, if you will, how distinctly not amused they are with all the history-tampering they've had the deepest displeasure of witnessing.
This argument is old, tired, and now beyond offensive. While I expect this type of behavior from Westerners, fellow POC have no excuse and it will not be tolerated, especially with all the noses which conveniently go missing from Kemetic statuary. Cut it out.
The Ancient Kemites were black. They described their skin and their very country as black (hence Kemmui--"black"--and Kemet--"Black Land"). Even friggin' "Egypt" is derived from the Greek "Aigyptos" meaning...*drum roll*..."Land of the Burnt Faces."
Speaking of Greek-folk...Herodotus, Aristotle, Socrates, and Diodorus of Sicily all spoke of the Kemites being black, and mind you, I find it highly hypocritical of you Western-folk to revere these men like gods right up until they start saying things you don't want to hear.
Fuck...even some of you aren't buying this bullshit anymore.
(Notice how when the [Arabic] Egyptian government tried to get the Rosetta Stone from the British Museum by pulling the bullshit "it's a part of 'our' identity" routine, the Brits basically rolled their eyes at them and sent them a fucking replica--uh, poetic much?)
Fashion tip from Moi: Colonialism? So not en vogue, and so 1200 years ago--it does not endear you to us. Ergo, 2010 is an excellent time to stop telling people to "ignore" the consistent use of dark woods, dark clays, dark paints, and dark stones Kemites used when portraying themselves in art. Like...obvious & desperate much? And Arabs? Stop telling tourists to not speak or even think of the Kemites as Negro...even when your own people tend to mistake black tourists for ethnic Egyptians.
And stop telling us about how Kemites distinguished themselves from Nubians (Ethiopians) and put up signs to keep them out--no shit, they distinguished themselves and put up signs to keep Nubians out. Kemet was a former colony of Nubia--exactly what part of "people don't forgive or forget that shit" are you not understanding? Does it hit so close to home that you have to fall back on some old-fashioned denial?
Grow up and stop fucking with our history. Keywords? Our history.
Give it up already; it reeks of the same bull the West tried to pull with the ruins of Great Zimbabwe*. It ain't yours. All you colonial throwbacks can swap, squabble over, and even deface our ancestors' art, but the legacy itself will never be yours. You have your own damn histories--go drool over Stonehenge or Mecca or Medina and just leave us the fuck be already.
PS - And for any white/Arab folks who read this and ask, "Why does it matter? It was thousands of years ago. Why do you care?" 1) FAIL...I can't believe you'd even try to pull that juvenile, outdated shit on here with moi--of all people--and 2) Go ask your own folks the same questions. Rub it in while you're at it, like, "Seriously...why does it matter to you so much? It's not your continent. They're not your people. It's not your heritage. It was thousands of years ago. Why do you care so much? And what's with all the 'colonial chic'? Like...I thought that lack of color was out this year. How is pulling shit like this supposed to get black people to stop bitching about racism?"
Hint: it doesn't.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(depicted above: Queen Tiy [c. 1398-1338 BCE], wife of Pharoah Amenhotep III)
*quick update


8 Comments:
Um, what? People honestly think the ancient Egyptians were white? Is it once again a case of whites thinking that blacks couldn't possibly have built such an advanced culture.
I've seriously heard of this earlier, about the ruins of some great city elsewhere in Africa (can't remember the name or location right now). For centuries Europeans made up theories of a powerful white king and his mysterious kingdom - because they couldn't admit that it may have actually been those "primitive" blacks who built the city. >_>
Are you referring to the ruins of Great Zimbabwe?
Yeah, it was probably those ruins - and after some Wikisearching I realized the vague memories I had about a "powerful white king" were from a different legend altogether, my bad.
The history of censorship mentioned in that article is just disgusting. Some people really go to any lengths to keep their privilege.
Oh yeah...it made me shudder. I immediately thought of one of the videos I linked in my post, where the speaker recalls a conference in which an angry Arab stood up and said, "Even if they were black, they were white!"
Thank you for writing this. I've been linking as many people as I possibly can back to your site after this mess:
http://www.racialicious.com/2010/03/26/conservative-havard-students-mock-ethnic-and-gender-studies/
Ive been furious ever since...
@ Kymie
Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you for that!!!!
Damn!!!
You are more than welcome. I have YET to stop shaking. Please continue to write. Your knowledge and insight is more than appreciated.
You're welcome too! And thanks to you, I completed a new case study on this drapto today. Check out #8, "Faux Pas and Fables".
Post a Comment
I'm now allowing all folks to leave comments, not just bloggers and folks with Gmail accounts. However, post as "Anonymous" and you will automatically be deleted. Read the Comments Policy BEFORE you post!!!