Gosh, I hope I wasn’t ambivalent in that headline.
For those of you blessed enough to live under a rock, “Kwanzaa” is a made up holiday which is celebrated by certain, misguided, members of the Black community in this country. The only reason this, so-called, holiday gets to see the light of day from the rest of the country can be summed up in three words. “White Man’s Guilt”.
First, the facts.
Kwanzaa is the creation of one Ron Karenga, born Ronald Everett. Mr. Karenga (He has legally changed his name, so I’m not going to employ the “Cassius Clay” technique here.) invented the holiday in 1966 while a member of a Black Nationalist group called “Organization US“.
We are going to ignore, for the most part, the fact that this organization was at odds with other Black Nationalist groups such as the Black Panthers and that the organization was responsible for killing two Black Panthers over the issue of who would take over a teaching position.
We won’t even focus on the fact that Karenga and a couple of his followers were sentenced to prison.
“In 1971, Karenga, Louis Smith, and Luz Maria Tamayo were convicted of felony assault and imprisoned for allegedly assaulting and torturing two women members of US, Deborah Jones and Gail Davis. A May 14, 1971, article in the Los Angeles Times described the testimony of one of the women: “Deborah Jones, who once was given the Swahili title of an African queen, said she and Gail Davis were whipped with an electrical cord and beaten with a karate baton after being ordered to remove their clothes. She testified that a hot soldering iron was placed in Miss Davis’ mouth and placed against Miss Davis’ face and that one of her own big toes was tightened in a vise. Karenga, head of US, also put detergent and running hoses in their mouths, she said. They also were hit on the heads with toasters.”
We’re not going to talk about the fact that Karenga is a scumbag because the case against “Kwanzaa” can be made much more easily without those facts getting in the way.
Let’s start with a simple test.
Who celebrates the virtues “Unity, Self-Determination, Collective Work and Responsibility, Cooperative Economics, Purpose, Creativity, and Faith”?
- Marxists
- People who celebrate “Kwanzaa”
- All of the above
If you took option number 3, congratulations! Karenga doesn’t deny that he “cribbed” these principles directly from Marxism. “Collective Work”? “Cooperative Economics”? Meh.
Then, of course, there is the name itself. “Kwanzaa” is derived from the Swahili phrase for “First Fruits” (or “First Harvest”) matunda ya kwanza. Now call me crazy, but isn’t December an odd time of year to have a holiday celebrating “First Fruits”? And Swahili? Now, I admit that I am no college professor of history, but I do know a couple of things.
- African slaves that were sent to North America came primarily from West Africa.
- Swahili was spoken primarily in East Africa.
This would be roughly equivalent to creating a Spanish holiday based on Muscovite culture and Russian traditions on the grounds that “It’s all European, isn’t it?” Now I realize that all white people look alike, but c’mon, will ya?
So we have a Convicted Felon and erstwhile 1960’s radical who is making up a holiday based on Marxist beliefs and a culture that he isn’t even a part of. That’s a Charlie Brown special waiting to happen, isn’t it?
Far be it from me to piss all over a cultural holiday that isn’t my own. I don’t write rants saying that Ramadan isn’t a real holiday because I’m not a Muslim. I don’t claim that Hanukkah isn’t worth celebrating or acknowledging because I happen not to be Jewish. Hell, my claim to Christianity is so thin that I could pick my teeth with it, but that doesn’t stop me from celebrating Christmas every year.
So why hate on “Kwanzaa”?
Because it is a lie, based on lies, and perpetuated by liars. Because every time some idiot with an attitude tries to “correct” me by saying “Happy Kwanzaa” every time I wish them a Merry Christmas, I want to scoop out their entrails with a rusty spork. The only thing worse than not knowing your history is to make it up and expect the rest of us to believe it out of an expectation of racial guilt. The world didn’t buy it when it was called “Aryanism” and perpetuated by some “German” named Adolf Hitler, and it shouldn’t buy into it now.
Fuck that, and fuck “Kwanzaa”.
Merry Christmas!
-Grim
