SERIAL Organization Concept Note
Racism, together with its racial discrimination manifestations, is rightly recognized as one of the biggest blights of human societies, having probably reached its most notorious heights with the Nazi race theories and atrocities of the Second World War. For Africans and people of immediate African descent, the encounter with racism has, of course, a long and painful history.
That being said, though, it is equally true to note that the post-war period has seen a great deal of effort and resources being channeled, particularly in the Western world, into the battle to combat, if not eradicate, this evil. Much has been achieved in that direction, particularly with the post-war advent of major global institutions such as the United Nations, which in 1948, for instance, adopted the landmark Universal Declaration Of Human Rights that expressly condemned racism and prohibited the adoption by Member States of racially discriminatory laws. Equally notable in this context is, of course, the great Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and 1970s in the United States that led to the dismantling of the segregation regime, especially in the country’s South. Similarly, closer to home here in Africa, the same anti-racism movement was instrumental in the collapse of the apartheid system in South Africa, and it is actually the case that nearly every national constitution today contains a prohibition of racial discrimination.
While, indeed, such progress has been made, especially in the immediate objective of dismantling the instruments of overt racial discrimination, the reality is that the war on racism has actually stalled in one important respect: events on the ground, be it, for instance, the series of deadly encounters between young black men and white police officers in the United States, or the rash of racist incidents that currently mar the face of football in Europe, have underscored the fact that, despite the progress thus far made, there remains an underlying racial bias mindset in any given population in the West, for example, which refuses to go away and so continues to manifest itself in various ways.
Now, the problem with mindsets is that they are intractable and difficult to change, or erase, and yet must, at the same time, be changed, or erased, if their negative impact is to be successfully countered. There are few better illustrations and reminders of this persistent and difficult-to-erase nature of the racial bias mindset than an image carried in the Newsweek (magazine) of 28 July, 2017. The image is of what is officially recognized as the first organized anti-racism protest march by African-Americans – dubbed the “Silent Protest Parade”- which took place in New York on 28 July, 1917. Thus, this struggle to eliminate the racial bias mindset in America has been going on for over a century, and with official and strong social backing for a good part of that period, and yet we are still stuck with it, so to speak!
The book OF BLACK SERVITUDE WITHOUT SLAVERY, The Unspoken Politics Of The English Language (OBS), authored by our Founder-Chairman, Agwu Ukiwe OKALI, highlights this problem of mindset and demonstrates that, in order to effectively combat a negative mindset, one must first identify its origin and sustenance – its well-spring, as it were – so as to be able to tackle the problem at its roots. It further argues that language is often a major repository, as well as purveyor, of racial bias, thereby, knowingly or otherwise, creating a racial bias mindset in its practitioners. The English language, the world’s dominant and virtually only global language,is then used to illustrate the thesis. Now, someone who comes to the English language for the first time and who is, therefore, not too immersed in it to notice (as many in the English-speaking world are) will quickly discover an interesting and important characteristic of the language and its thought processes: that there is a pro-white/anti-black bias embedded in the language that is reflected in a systemic denigration of “blackness” and corresponding glorification of “whiteness”, as illustrated by expressions such as blacklist, black sheep, painting someone black, etc. and white list, white knight, white lie, etc. The result of this is a “blackness of bad/whiteness of good, badness of black/goodness of white” narrative that runs through the language in which “black” basically denotes “bad” and “white”, in turn, denotes “good”. Such a narrative, imbibed over a period (often from birth), and reinforced by everyday usage, must undoubtedly create in users of the language mindset that is conditioned, subconsciously at least, to shun “black” things while instinctively inclining themselves more favorably towards things designated as “white”.
So, then, what happens to black people under such a scenario? The answer is simple, predictable and unfortunate: in a process propelled by the scientifically well-known phenomenon of “word association” they easily become subsumed, subconsciously at least, into the general category of “black”, and, therefore, “bad”, things, which, in turn, triggers the preprogrammed negative reaction (racial bias) in the other person, regardless of intentions, leaving that other person’s conscious mind striving, in the best-case scenario, to counteract this effect.
There are three rather significant and practical consequences of such a racial bias mindset that may be noted here. Firstly, it leads, of course, to racial discrimination, not only of the blatant “white supremacy” type but also of the subtle “unconscious” type such as the well-documented phenomenon of judges in Western societies typically imposing harsher (usually custodial) sentences on black accused than their white counterparts for identical offenses.
Secondly, and critically, it creates a deep-lying psychological resistance to the idea of racial parity, which may arise, quite possibly, from such parity being instinctively perceived as somehow seeking to equate “bad” (i.e. black”) with “good” (i.e. white)! This psychological resistance factor, born of the racial bias mindset, probably also accounts, as noted in the book, for what may seem like a baffling reality of this situation: the stubborn persistence and durability of the phenomenon of racial bias and discrimination, as noted above, despite decades of effort, sometimes huge and sustained, as in the US Civil Rights era, at its eradication. It, correspondingly, also validates the book’s argument that it is well-nigh impossible for progress of a fundamental and conclusive nature to occur in the fight against racism and racial discrimination while the “blackness of bad…” narrative and the mindset it creates and sustains remain intact.
The third very important, but easily overlooked, aspect of the “blackness of bad/whiteness of good” narrative, as noted in OBS, is its implicit endorsement, if not indeed creation, almost by definition, of a hierarchy of races: one in which the white race sits at the top or “good” end, the black at the bottom or “bad” end, and the others fit in-between, according to their perceived closeness to either of the end occupants! This particular piece of realism should no doubt be of special interest to members of the other non-white races that may possibly think themselves exempt from the effect of the racial bias mindset associated with this “blackness of bad…” narrative.
Viewed from the foregoing perspective, therefore, combatting the “blackness of bad/whiteness of good” narrative in the English language should thus become a top strategic objective of the antiracism struggle. This echoes the assertion in the SERIAL Founder’s Vision Statement that “To overcome racism of this ilk, one first must, therefore, correct the language to correct the mind”.
The foregoing analysis very clearly underscores for us, therefore, that tackling the racial bias mindset is a must in the fight against racism, and, furthermore, that success in that endeavor, in turn, requires tackling the problem at its roots and flow source, which, under the thesis advanced herein, means the pertinent language milieu. In a comprehensive review of the ways and means to achieve this objective, the book OBS advances the idea of establishing a global organization to spearhead such a drive. It is in pursuit of this that an organization, provisionally titled SOCIETY FOR THE ELIMINATION OF RACISM IN ALL LANGUAGE (SERIAL), is being proposed, as set forth herein.