It was 47 years ago when Black History Month was officially recognized by President Gerald Ford. The concept grew from “Negro History Week,” which was introduced by Harvard scholar Carter G. Woodson and other prominent black Americans in 1926. Woodson chose a week in February because of Frederick Douglass, who was born enslaved and did not know his actual birth date but chose to celebrate it on February 14 – and Abraham Lincoln, whose birthday was February 12.
As we begin Black History Month, and see constantly growing racial tensions, one could almost think that black Americans have not progressed at all. The media is constantly inundating us with racialized stories. In keeping with the divide and conquer tactics applied to many aspects of society and politics, they give us a binary choice on all issues regarding race. From household income to media representation, to prison, to education – it is emphasized that black Americans statistically fall behind whites. Despite so many different ethnic groups in America, the narrative is always about comparing blacks and whites.
Similarly, Leftist intellectuals push binary narratives. “Either there’s something wrong or inferior about black people or it’s racial discrimination. Those are the only two explanations,” says Ibram X. Kendi, formerly known as Henry Rogers. It is hard to believe that someone so highly regarded amongst American intellectual elites could come up with something so simpleminded.
It’s not the fact that Kendi and his acolytes have doltish ideas; that is typical for human beings. It is the fact that these ideas have been allowed to permeate society, where the binary narrative is being used by those in power to crush critical thought and dominate the people. If we are so busy fighting each other over childlike labels, how can we ever come together and demand real justice?
This binary choice of being either racist or anti-racist has been embedded into mainstream society in what seems like a very short period of time. To take a stand against racism seems like an uncontroversial thing. Racism is not only evil – it’s completely irrational. But the concept of anti-racism has been hijacked by people with a different agenda that goes beyond fighting prejudice and discrimination: Marxists and communists, who are using America’s historical trauma of racism as a vehicle to implement their own nefarious plans.
The combination of a Communist worldview seeded by a small group of whites in the background – publicly uplifted by a few blacks, celebrated by mainstream media – and the promotion of “white guilt” has sprung America’s racial tensions into an astonishing level of calamity. These forces have co-opted and weaponized Black History Month for their own destructive ends. February is no longer a reflection of black American excellence and what our nation has accomplished together, but instead an indictment of America.
Today, black Americans have greater material success than any other time in history but have become spiritually and culturally unrecognizable. The breakdown of the family has been the biggest driver of this deterioration. To push the idea that blacks lack agency, are perpetual victims and permanently suspended in an inferior state are antithetical to the values that has led so many black Americans to lead successful, productive and happy lives in the past.
If blacks are constantly sold that the struggle is based on immutable melanin levels and the successes are waved away as mere anomalies, how is the next generation of black Americans supposed to understand they have a privilege being born in America that many have died to obtain?
We have become a country that uplifts decadence, debauchery and weakness instead of a nation that strives to create the next generation of notable Americans who inspire greatness due to their God-given unique abilities. Black Americans have more power than ever before. We can either build upon the ideas of Booker T. Washington and Frederick Douglass, whose works remain fixed in American society, or allow unsophisticated charlatans like Henry “Ibram X. Kendi” Rogers to topple Washington and Douglass’s feats.
This month, I will be thinking about the true potential we all possess, and the heroes of the past that got us here. We cannot let the Left’s useful idiots and tools of tyranny take down the greatest nation in the history of the world. I’m free, I’m proud, I’m strong. And so are you. Let’s get to work.
Quisha King is a Duval County parent and Deputy Director of Legislative Affairs for Building Education for Students Together (BEST), a project of FreedomWorks.
