To everyone expressing outrage at the systematic enslavement of African people in Libya, North Africa, of course this is a terrible crime and we must stop it. These types of incredible tragedies happen in Africa repeatedly, and for the same reasons; the masses of people in Africa remain powerless and disorganized. There is absolutely no person living and breathing who can dispute this. That's why its more than a little frustrating that many of the folks screaming the loudest today about slavery in Libya, were no where to be found when support for the Libya's previous government; the Libyan Socialist Jamihiriya was in power, up until 2011. This is very important people. We have to learn from history! The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. When oppressive practices are exposed in Africa; whether its the mining industries (coltan, cocoa, diamonds, gold, etc), oppression against women, the proliferation of U.S. military bases in Africa (Afro-com), the response of mostly well meaning activists is to widely expose the issue (good), and then immediately and systemically turn to reformist approaches controlled by capitalist countries like the U.S., Britain, and France, to address these issues on a singular and disconnected basis. The results? The problems continue and get worse.
This is the unfortunate, sad, and tragic story of Libya. Many of these well meaning people are very quick to point out that this slave trade is victimizing Africans (Black people) and is being carried out by Arabs. These folks point this out because they hold the position that the problem is simply an issue of Arabs being in Africa. These people proudly point to a history of Arabs participating in the trans-Atlantic slave trade as if this current sad situation is some sort of historical connection to the specific relationship of oppression between the Arabs exploiting Africans. This may be a convenient version of history, but it is classically unscientific and a-historical. Of course, Arabs participated in selling Africans into slavery during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Of course Europeans dominated this slave trade. And, yes, Africans participated in selling other Africans. First, its important to differentiate the economic period dominated by slavery several thousands of years ago from the trans-Atlantic slave slave of just 150 years ago. Thousands of years ago, evolving from the dominant period of communalism as the world's most prolific form of economic operations, slavery was the system that was in existence in every country on the planet Earth. This is an ill refutable fact. This means everyone had slavery. In fact, it was this system of slavery, which produced the first class divisions in the world, that created class differences that eventually led to feudalism becoming the dominant economic system in the world. These class divisions have always proven to be much deeper than any racial divisions and this is proven by the fact the Europeans who came into Africa, the Arabs who came to exploit, they each had little difficulty in finding elite classes of Africans who were more than willing to wheel and deal with them in order to sell out the masses of people. This reality set the stage for the trans-Atlantic slave trade where elite Europeans, Arabs, and Africans, participated jointly in the enslavement of the masses of African people. This fact is shocking to people. It will make some people mad, especially the anti-European/Arab elements within our communities, but it is 100% ill-refutable by anyone who engages in even the most basic study of African history.
The above history obliterates the fantasy peddled by race hustlers within our communities who wish us to believe that we were all skipping around Africa as kings and queens for thousands of years. They wish us to believe this because in doing so, we probably won't be critical enough in our thinking to see their black power pimp plan to use our people's struggle today to financially benefit from our suffering. Most of these people are the descendants of those who sold us into slavery. Those that aren't are confused because of their pain at experiencing our suffering. This pain has caused some of us to lash out at all Europeans and Arabs in this unscientific way. The point is clearly, if all of us were kings and queens, who were the subjects? Everyone knows that subjects don't exist on the same level as the kings and queens. Listen to this. If you are African in the Western Hemisphere, your people were certainly subjects who were sold by the elites into slavery. Just take a deep breath and accept it because its ill refutable. If you wake up to this reality, maybe you can grow to the point where you, like me, want to overthrow the kings/queens. This is all tough to take, but if we are going to truly understand what's happening in Libya in order to do something to stop it from happening there and everywhere else, we have to see the world scientifically.
The problem in Libya isn't just Arabs being there. Why, just six short years ago, Africans in Libya were the most secure and prosperous in all of Africa. This is again, ill refutable. The Libyan Jamihiriya, under Muammar Qaddafi had achieved a level of socialist development that had made Libya the pinnacle in Africa for standard of living, education, health care, and every other area of life. Due to this, Qaddafi was the most popular person in Africa. If you don't believe that, just talk to Africans living in and around the Sahara Desert. Libya had successfully created an advanced water distribution system that regularly delivered potable water to people in and around the Sahara, something that was unthinkable just 20 years ago. And Qaddafi never had small plans. His country led the charge to bring Africa into technological advancement by introducing the concept of the Libyan Dinar (currency) that Libya was proposing to become Africa's currency under a united Africa that Kwame Nkrumah, Sekou Ture, Amy and Marcus Garvey, Malcolm X, and other Pan-Africanists dedicated their lives to achieve. The dinar would be backed by Libyan gold and the implementation of this vision would have changed the game in the international economic arena. This is why the Jamihiriya was relentlessly attacked in 2010/11. If you recall, this attack was couched in the so-called "Arab Spring" uprisings which were supposed to be popular movements against regimes in the Middle East. A so-called Transitional Council emerged as the "democratic forces who were going to liberate Libya", but once Qaddafi was brutally hunted down and savagely murdered, even the so-called Transitional Council admitted that were it not for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) relentless bombing and satellite surveillance, they could never have "won" in Libya. Translation; these criminal forces relied on imperialism's terrorism to overcome all real popular support Qaddafi maintained. The aftermath is NATO destroyed all Libyan infrastructure, including the Great Man made Lake (GMR) or Wasra Dam project. The gold was stolen. And, in a matter of a blink of an eye, Libya went from the most stable place in Africa to one of the most dangerous. Any student of Revolution knows that revolutionary struggle is designed to benefit the people on the bottom of society. if you study Libyan history, particularly the history of Qaddafi himself, you will learn that he was born poor in the Benoin Desert region of Libya. When he led a successful takeover of power on September 1, 1969, he immediately put in place policies that benefited the poorest in his country, many of whom hailed from the same desert region that he did. The majority of folks from Benoin are so-called Black people. So, immediately after these thugs called the Transitional Council were handed power of Libya by the imperialists, they began a terrorist campaign designed to punish the people who supported the Jamihiriya, which was the only force in that region that prevented them from exercising their oppressive tactics against the people there.
So, this slave trade of course has racist elements within it. Everything in this capitalist dominated world has that. But the foundation of this tragedy is imperialism's destruction of the Libyan Jamihiriya. This was the work of Obama (and Hillary Clinton) the recent descendant of those elite Africans who sold us into slavery and the spokesperson for imperialism in 2011. So, for those of you who want to frame this within a strictly racial lense, recognize that your racial vision should have Obama squarely in the sights. They savagely destroyed Libya, like they attempted to do in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and everywhere their feet touch down.
Just remember that this slave trade in Libya could not happen without imperialism. Boko Haram's presence in Africa could not happen without imperialism. ISIS could not happen without the contributions of imperialism. So, if you truly want to stop this slave trade in Libya, we have to address the issue of imperialism. If you never did anything when the Libyan Jamihiriya was under attack. If you ignored those of us who talked to you about it, that's ok, but its time to correct the problem. We cannot correct this issue without addressing the core problem. Until the African masses are organized and united, we will not have the capacity to stop these attacks against our people. Whether its slavery in Libya, terrorism against our babies in Nigeria, or police terrorism against us in the Western Hemisphere, this still rings true. We owe ourselves more than just reacting and getting upset. We have to join organizations working to organize our people. If we truly want to solve problems like this, that is really the only way.
This is the unfortunate, sad, and tragic story of Libya. Many of these well meaning people are very quick to point out that this slave trade is victimizing Africans (Black people) and is being carried out by Arabs. These folks point this out because they hold the position that the problem is simply an issue of Arabs being in Africa. These people proudly point to a history of Arabs participating in the trans-Atlantic slave trade as if this current sad situation is some sort of historical connection to the specific relationship of oppression between the Arabs exploiting Africans. This may be a convenient version of history, but it is classically unscientific and a-historical. Of course, Arabs participated in selling Africans into slavery during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Of course Europeans dominated this slave trade. And, yes, Africans participated in selling other Africans. First, its important to differentiate the economic period dominated by slavery several thousands of years ago from the trans-Atlantic slave slave of just 150 years ago. Thousands of years ago, evolving from the dominant period of communalism as the world's most prolific form of economic operations, slavery was the system that was in existence in every country on the planet Earth. This is an ill refutable fact. This means everyone had slavery. In fact, it was this system of slavery, which produced the first class divisions in the world, that created class differences that eventually led to feudalism becoming the dominant economic system in the world. These class divisions have always proven to be much deeper than any racial divisions and this is proven by the fact the Europeans who came into Africa, the Arabs who came to exploit, they each had little difficulty in finding elite classes of Africans who were more than willing to wheel and deal with them in order to sell out the masses of people. This reality set the stage for the trans-Atlantic slave trade where elite Europeans, Arabs, and Africans, participated jointly in the enslavement of the masses of African people. This fact is shocking to people. It will make some people mad, especially the anti-European/Arab elements within our communities, but it is 100% ill-refutable by anyone who engages in even the most basic study of African history.
The above history obliterates the fantasy peddled by race hustlers within our communities who wish us to believe that we were all skipping around Africa as kings and queens for thousands of years. They wish us to believe this because in doing so, we probably won't be critical enough in our thinking to see their black power pimp plan to use our people's struggle today to financially benefit from our suffering. Most of these people are the descendants of those who sold us into slavery. Those that aren't are confused because of their pain at experiencing our suffering. This pain has caused some of us to lash out at all Europeans and Arabs in this unscientific way. The point is clearly, if all of us were kings and queens, who were the subjects? Everyone knows that subjects don't exist on the same level as the kings and queens. Listen to this. If you are African in the Western Hemisphere, your people were certainly subjects who were sold by the elites into slavery. Just take a deep breath and accept it because its ill refutable. If you wake up to this reality, maybe you can grow to the point where you, like me, want to overthrow the kings/queens. This is all tough to take, but if we are going to truly understand what's happening in Libya in order to do something to stop it from happening there and everywhere else, we have to see the world scientifically.
The problem in Libya isn't just Arabs being there. Why, just six short years ago, Africans in Libya were the most secure and prosperous in all of Africa. This is again, ill refutable. The Libyan Jamihiriya, under Muammar Qaddafi had achieved a level of socialist development that had made Libya the pinnacle in Africa for standard of living, education, health care, and every other area of life. Due to this, Qaddafi was the most popular person in Africa. If you don't believe that, just talk to Africans living in and around the Sahara Desert. Libya had successfully created an advanced water distribution system that regularly delivered potable water to people in and around the Sahara, something that was unthinkable just 20 years ago. And Qaddafi never had small plans. His country led the charge to bring Africa into technological advancement by introducing the concept of the Libyan Dinar (currency) that Libya was proposing to become Africa's currency under a united Africa that Kwame Nkrumah, Sekou Ture, Amy and Marcus Garvey, Malcolm X, and other Pan-Africanists dedicated their lives to achieve. The dinar would be backed by Libyan gold and the implementation of this vision would have changed the game in the international economic arena. This is why the Jamihiriya was relentlessly attacked in 2010/11. If you recall, this attack was couched in the so-called "Arab Spring" uprisings which were supposed to be popular movements against regimes in the Middle East. A so-called Transitional Council emerged as the "democratic forces who were going to liberate Libya", but once Qaddafi was brutally hunted down and savagely murdered, even the so-called Transitional Council admitted that were it not for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) relentless bombing and satellite surveillance, they could never have "won" in Libya. Translation; these criminal forces relied on imperialism's terrorism to overcome all real popular support Qaddafi maintained. The aftermath is NATO destroyed all Libyan infrastructure, including the Great Man made Lake (GMR) or Wasra Dam project. The gold was stolen. And, in a matter of a blink of an eye, Libya went from the most stable place in Africa to one of the most dangerous. Any student of Revolution knows that revolutionary struggle is designed to benefit the people on the bottom of society. if you study Libyan history, particularly the history of Qaddafi himself, you will learn that he was born poor in the Benoin Desert region of Libya. When he led a successful takeover of power on September 1, 1969, he immediately put in place policies that benefited the poorest in his country, many of whom hailed from the same desert region that he did. The majority of folks from Benoin are so-called Black people. So, immediately after these thugs called the Transitional Council were handed power of Libya by the imperialists, they began a terrorist campaign designed to punish the people who supported the Jamihiriya, which was the only force in that region that prevented them from exercising their oppressive tactics against the people there.
So, this slave trade of course has racist elements within it. Everything in this capitalist dominated world has that. But the foundation of this tragedy is imperialism's destruction of the Libyan Jamihiriya. This was the work of Obama (and Hillary Clinton) the recent descendant of those elite Africans who sold us into slavery and the spokesperson for imperialism in 2011. So, for those of you who want to frame this within a strictly racial lense, recognize that your racial vision should have Obama squarely in the sights. They savagely destroyed Libya, like they attempted to do in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and everywhere their feet touch down.
Just remember that this slave trade in Libya could not happen without imperialism. Boko Haram's presence in Africa could not happen without imperialism. ISIS could not happen without the contributions of imperialism. So, if you truly want to stop this slave trade in Libya, we have to address the issue of imperialism. If you never did anything when the Libyan Jamihiriya was under attack. If you ignored those of us who talked to you about it, that's ok, but its time to correct the problem. We cannot correct this issue without addressing the core problem. Until the African masses are organized and united, we will not have the capacity to stop these attacks against our people. Whether its slavery in Libya, terrorism against our babies in Nigeria, or police terrorism against us in the Western Hemisphere, this still rings true. We owe ourselves more than just reacting and getting upset. We have to join organizations working to organize our people. If we truly want to solve problems like this, that is really the only way.
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