Modern religions as an obstruction to indigenous cultures

Here is a message so many would find hateful simply because they don't know the history of the catholic church or don't care to know. Religion has caused so much hatred as each claim to have the ultimate truth. The truth of the matter is  that best of them is the one we all keep to ourselves and never use it as a means of dividing ourselves for no good reason. It would be great is everyone kept the good news, that supposedly brings salvation to the world but ends up destroying it, to themselves. It's hard enough agreeing on things we can see, leave alone things we can't see and will most likely never see. 

Catholicism historically looks and treats indigenous religions as stupid, backward and useless. It actively fought other denominations as well as other indigenous religions to eliminate competition.  There was all manner of subterfuge to maintain that dominance and no means were considered extreme. To be fair, Catholicism was not alone in using belief to gain political and economic power by peddling lies and ignorance. 

While I don't advocate abusive language,  I think it's quite insincere for those asking the person who posted this article to respect Catholics when the institution has so much blood on it's hands.

When you know the truth and you have the courage to tell that truth, true salvation is born every single. That salvation is called light and it destroys darkness. It's only through the illuminating light of knowledge, truth, love,justice and harmony to life thrives.

I am sending that illuminating energy on this most somber day, a day  whose energy has been usurped by the the forces of darkness. 

I am celebrating this solemn day for I am always amazed that I did finally see the light and I am free of the control of those dark forces. Much gratitude for those who stood guard at the gates of that illuminating light even when it cost them their lives. It's truly better to die than to live in darkness, though darkness is a form of death itself.

 Ignorance out of habit is still ignorance. It doesn't matter if everyone believes it or if my grandmother who was 200 years old believed it.

It matters not if that ignorance was originated by your brother, white people or is made in China. Only truth stands the test of time.

I am therefore not singing and shouting today over temporary joy that will disappear tomorrow. I am learning on a solid rock whose only constance is that it changes always. I stand ready to grasp more light. Religion on the other has one truth that only begrudgingly changes.

Pyramids of the Soul

What a pleasant surprise to hear from an old friend and an Africanist at heart. The Gillenwaters family were great friends from the early 1990s. This is just one of the hundreds of relationships I built in Memphis with African Americans that changed me for life. It's because of these kind of relationships that I strive to be a better African first and then a better human being second. 

I understood our history and struggle to be human better because of what my Kenyan sensibilities could perceive when around that environment.  Other people played some roles but I have to admit that being around the best and the worst of our experience brought a part of me that was too deeply buried within.  Many will not understand and I am fine with that.

The piece of art here reminds me of my deep hustle that would see me through hell if I needed. It is not simply art, but has a types of relationships and hands that finally came out to be what has been occupying my friend's wall for over a quarter of a century.  My oldest daughter probably has her fingerprints in the back of the art, being that she was always the loyal assistant.

 I was an art dealer in my first year of college and did some brisk business. What I didn't realize is that the experience was my introduction to anthropology and food activism. Many of my art negotiations took place in kitchen tables, barber shops and hair salons. 

My college friends were also like family in a mighty way. The professors were like guardians, uncles and aunts.  If you have never lived outside your home country, attending college and raising a daughter at the same time, just don't even try to imagine. I was also out of status and therefore undocumented for a while. Yet all these was just a passing cloud. It is for such reasons that I owe more than I can ever give. 

I would sell a piece of art, then visit the customers house to see their decor and then frame the piece to fit their decor. This same experience comes out in my approach to food and my love for people. Being in the kitchen of so many wonderful people's home made me feel less lonely. It also made me feel more secure knowing police officers, public officials, professional and most important intellectuals.

Memphis might be the city of the dead but it gave me princely life, love and light. More fire, black fire!

My Meeting With Prof. Ngugí Wa Thiong’o

Njathi wa Kabui

Back in 2004, I visited California for the first time. It just so happened that it was around election time.  The voting was actually taking place on the day following our arrival. This was a very special trip on various levels. Some of the reasons were planned and others not anticipated at all. 


Yet, the trip was memorable for various reasons. I have obviously revisited the trip in my solitude from time to time, and maybe it's to admit that as we age, we see things quite differently than we did during our young days. The laws of sustainable dictates that we share our expertise with the next generation to ensure that our culture becomes more efficient, effective and endearing.


My trip to California marked the first time I met my own "elder" scholar, the one and only Ngugì Wa Thiong'o. Elder Ngùgì was teaching at UC Davis and we were visiting our friends a few counties over. I had to pull all kinds of moves to make it to the meeting. Mugo Muchiri was extremely helpful in guiding me through the process. I met him then for the first time and our friendship is a remnant of that era. I also remember taking a taxi for the first time for the final leg of the trip there. 


I can't tell you how excited I was even at the thought of meeting a man who had influenced my intellectual development in ways I could never recount.


When I arrived on campus, I actually ran from where I was dropped off to his office. It wasn't hard to find, but once there, it was hard to leave.


I was a bit surprised about his height, but that was nothing compared to the lovely conversation. He is a true African intellectual.  From his hair to his shirt, everything matched the image I always had of great thinkers of history.


From our conversation that lasted about an hour and a half, I mostly remember of classic statement that he made. Ngugi looked at me straight in the face and told me, in a parable sort of way, and in impeccable Gìkùyù “ Tùciaraga tùgongithia ciene". That essentially means that we give birth and suckle other peoples children, which means that our babies ultimately starve or are demented.  


Shortly after, the polite Ngùgì called the Cab for me, and following our final exchange of niceties,  we parted ways.


I thought a lot about our conversation and even about the meeting itself. My head was spinning. I therefore hardly noticed when we arrived at my destination. I was going to a kenyan house where a group of fellow Kenyans held a weekly Bible study meeting.  The preacher would give me a ride back to our host as he lived in the same neighborhood. 


I knocked on the door and a young lady called me by both of my names. She continued to inform me that they had been expecting me. I was ushered in and offered a seat on one of the few empty spaces on the couch  following the introduction. The Bible class was going on. The Bible verse they were reading was about the false promise. A corrupt idiot by the name of Laban worked Jacob, his future son-in-law, for seven years and reneged on his promise to offer his second daughter in marriage. We all know the story and how seven years contract or indenture turned into 14 years. Jacob ended up marrying the two sisters.


I had already gotten over the Christianity gaze by then and I might have as well stayed outside. I had declined an opportunity to do a formal PhD and instead decided to do a 4 year independent study. I was suspicious that none of the PhD programs I had considered would answer my most fundamental question: why is Africans the world over in chains and how can they be free? I felt as though I would feel jilted at the end of my PhD program the same way Laban had done to Jacob. 


My reading had led me to understand what role religion played in our exploitation and also as an obstruction to our true liberation. Our conversation with elder Ngùgì wa Thiong'o was like a honey brew. It was causing my head to be light. 


Out of politeness I opted to seat around and simply be quiet.  Nobody seemed to notice my silence. The discussion went on as expected and was finally concluded. I sat there patiently, even as the others closed their eyes and prayed together. I uttered not a word. Not even an Amen.


With the Bible study over, the host offered the guests some tea and Mandazi. The TV was turned on as everybody wanted to get an update of the elections. John Kelley and George Bush were the two contenders.  

It quickly occured to me that the group was mostly in support of George Bush. His belief in Jesus was a major reason stated.

At some point the host noticed that I had said nothing. She wondered out loud if I was a supporter of Kelley as I did not seem all too excited with the news that showed Bush ahead.

In response, I told the middle aged woman that Africans have an eternal marriage of inconvenience with the West. Jacob was lucky he worked for 14 years for his bride. We have been living under the White gaze beginning with the fall of Egypt to the Romans, from 31 BC. The fall of Egypt marked the beginning of the fall of Africa. Now the Asians and Arabs have joined the fray in search of the Black Gold. 

I don't agree with Magesha Ngwiri's recent article where he argued that we are children of two worlds. Which World is hospitable to the Africans? If my grandmother in my village died while waiting for Jesus to come back, you know that the White Gaze is a serious matter. 

Africans know first hand that BLM doesn't mean anything to the Afrian leaders and power brokers. Most Africans don't know either of the two worlds Ngwiri was talking about. You can't be bilingual if you are not proficient in any single language. 

Study how Whites gained power and how Asians have changed their status relative to the west.  We don't have to copy anyone, but we can't avoid the work of a statecraft.  We don't have a double considering as W.E.B Dubois once said almost a hundred years ago in his book "Souls of Black Folk ''. What we have instead is a false consciousness.  Only a false consciousness can tolerate the delay of our struggle for true liberation. Only a people with a false consciousness would keep hoping for free liberation without a cost.

Tom Mwiraria was the last person I would have expected to call a clarion call first articulated by the real "elder" to many of us. How are we to grow up and fight for our own liberation if we continue to believe in contracts signed by dishonest powerful global elites that keep feeding us lies, both literally and figuratively?

Africans are not any special from any other group of people, liberation struggles and revolutions are not beauty contests. It wasn't easy as Maximilien Robespierre found in France found out, or Toussaint Louverture quickly found out in Haiti and so did Oliver Cromwell find out the getting rid of the crown in England wasn't necessarily a solution. Ironically,  Englad did so badly after the revolutionaries beheaded king Charles I that they had to reinstate the monarchy. 

I am beginning to suspect that some Africans seem to think we can adjust and conform to injustice and cultural domination.

James Baldwin once stated that " I am not your Neggar". Whatever or whatever you are willing to sacrifice your liberty for, that is what or who owns you. 

The revolution belongs to those who dream of tomorrow and those who appreciate that understanding that our lives are a sum total of all the battles that have been won and lost before. That same same rule of yesterday and today will apply to the next generation following yours.

Dream if you fancy, or study closely and understand the pains and fears that motivate those who dominate you. They shed a lot of blood to get to where they are ,and by extension,  to where we are. 

Socrates lived a simple but principled life. Few know who the wealthy people were in Athens at that time. Yet, this deadbeat father and not exactly the most handsome guy has the honor of dividing a discipline as glorious as philosophy.  All philosophers are classified as either pre or post Socratic.

I returned from a memorable vacation in California and the only thing that I am found worthy of writing from the whole trip was not all the fun things that I did with my friends but a meeting with this most ardent critic of all manner of injustices from linguistic oppression to human rights. Here is a man that I can honestly say has been living justly.. I live under the gaze of such souls.

Survival: THE SONG OF THE OPPRESSED

When i was about 11 years old, my older brother came home one Saturday evening with a small evelop. We were lucky enough to have owned a turntable. My brother turned it on and from the envelop, he produced a single vinyl record which he continued to play. That was the first time i heard song "Survival". I was instantly hooked and there is no telling how many times we played that record in the house.

I quickly schooled myself on the new craze and the prophet of that genre called Reggae. Brother Nesta was a brilliant musician and organizer. Together with the Wailers band, Bob produce some of the most recognizable melodic songs outside the European and American music. He propelled a genre of music that few would most likely have hardly recognized before Bob. Along with the music, he domesticated weed and a religion that is synonymous with Ganja. There are adherents of the Rasta religion in just about every country.

Yet, there are many others who are not affiliated with the Rasta but do apply many principles of that movement in their lives. Levity, as they call it is a practical and revolutionary way of living in harmony with nature. I would be remiss if I did not mention their cuisine that the movement introduced to many. The cuisine called Ital is available in most major cities, at least here in many places with a significant presence of Rasta brothers.

For me, Bob Marley was like an entry point into Fella Kuti. Those two might brothers formed the foundation that revolutionary African American thought would be nurtured. The three factors offered me the best mirror or eyes to resurrect an African Consciousness. Malcolm X, Amos Wilson and Hubert Harrison were similarly great thinkers whose message was easily digestible following my previous interaction with Reggae. Reggae is a vibe even the politicians of today can't stop. The one train it stopped for was the one of status quo and

So today I will play Ambush in the Night in commemoration of Brother Nesta's honest work. We have to come out of this cultural or political "night " and into the daylight of justice. Remember this words from "Survival" in light of the current crisis: Scientific atrocity Atomic misphilosophy Nuclear misenergy. We are now moving from I&I to I & Covit. Rassss!

A Season for a New South

During the month of August, 2012, Teli Shabu and I entertained a sizeable group for a dinner at Granite Farms. Teli had been entertaining our guests on his melodic Kora for a number of years already. It was the most appropriate dinner sounds I have ever heard. 

Yet the sound of the Kora is not even half of the story.  The Kora has such an engaging origin in Guinea,  West Africa, that it can only be matched by it's evolutionary journey to the modern stages of the most influential international music played by African musicians.  The Kora has 21 fishing strings connected to a guard and an wooden rod that makes the whole instrument looking like an odd shaped laddle covered with goat skin. 

The Kora has more than just light connections to food in its engineering, in any case, I had decided to make it a central part of my dinners and lectures. Teli's story was just as long. It obviously started in Africa, through the Transatlantic slave trade routes, then back to Africa where he leared the stories and the playing of the Kora and finally right back to the U.S.

How the instrument was invented is shrouded in more mystery than most instruments.  Two families came up with a similar story to each of their families about how each had came into the possession of the instrument.  For the longest time, those were the only the two families that could produce the kora instruments as well as the players. Those two skills was a highly guarded family secret. A few other families later joined the ranks of Koran dynasties and they all dominate the mellodic music to this day.

For all the instruments and musicians I could have engaged that night, none would have been more fitting than a kora.  I had a deep urge to give a talk that would reflect my on my experience of living in the South for over two decades. The Kora itself had evolved in West Africa as an instrument of historians or keepers of the village memory. The Kora players are known as griots.

Those kora players would serenade every important social gathering that were important to the community.  Then, just like now, the Kora player was a major attraction, not just for it's eclectic sound of griot but also for the amazing history that was all memorized in the Kora players head going back hundreds of years back. 

On that night, I was planning to take a deep and honest look at history of the place I had come to call home longer than I had lived in Africa as a turning point in my work. For that point, I wanted to talk about the of South with a view of finding a way to create a better society in a bid to correct some the damages that left all transatlantic cultures deeply wounded. The three cultures I am referring to are Africans, Southern Whites and African America that came out of the interactions between the first two cultures.

I had been active in community organizing for almost 5 years before joing culinary school.  I felt especially honored that my friends whom I had been working with around issues of food justice were present. Others showed up for the first time and a few have remained friends ever since. 

 Roxanne L London and Maya Corneille, for example, continued to be major supporters in my learning and growth. Many others supported my efforts through their organizations. A representative of Burts office in Durham,  the largest sustainable body products in the U.S , was present. 

Maya Corneille, a professor of psychology at A&T University at the time, was a major advisor and strategist.  She also doubled up as a s'ues chef along a group of two Durhamites ladies: Andrea Horn and Bree Davis.  Devin D. Brown was mostly the only male in the Durham team. Devin was like the coach. He was the one who put the Durham group together. Where Devin went, we followed. He was and still is a kindred spirit. The group kept vigil like Cassandra in Divine Comedy during the most difficult years my work. 

Roxanne L London was a warrior per excellence.  She just showed in force and did what needed to be done. One thing that was unique about Roxanne was that she never showed up alone. She was rather quiet but hard to miss or forget. She kept company of strong souls, like Kim Soden and many others.

It was also the first time I talked about a concept I later called Blackism. While I did not call it that at the time, all the energy from the event caused me to take lots of notes about what I observed and felt. It was definitely the most intensive dinner I ever had until that day. I felt as if it was a major turning point and in so many ways it was.  It was also my first dinner to appear in a major magazine too. That meant having three photographer periodically coming in and out of the kitchen. In addition,  Kelly Taylor, my best teacher from culinary school was a guest. But she would periodically pop in and that was quite comforting. 

My friend Meri Hyöky and international photographer showed with a camera after many conversations online.  Meri had deep interests in food and activism.  She captured more of my events during these formative years for free. I obviously couldn't have afforded to pay many of the services that many of those friends graciously offered. 

I was shocked beyond words when a strong-built lady introduced herself as Meri in the steamy kitchen almost halfway int the dinner preparation. I had always thought I had been conversing with a man during our many social media texts. Her Finish name made it hard to identify her gender. This was the beginning of a two years of very productive collaboration. She would later marry her girlfriend a few years later and I am happy for them.  

Teza Tessa Eliza Thraves was also in attendance and she too has deep and strong footprints in my understanding of food in the South in all its complexities. She once invited me along with some young African American student farmers to a weekend workshop in Lynchburg Virginia where Will Allen was conducting a workshop on acquaponics. 

Will would go on to win the McArthur genius award years later. Will also built the garden for Mitchell Obama at the White House. The workshop and conversation at hotel we stayed at was pivotal. 

Teza would later marry her girlfriend in an elaborate wedding.  These souls amongst others taught me tolerance galore. There are so many things that I don't understand and even more that I will never understand.  

What I can say is that of all the problems we as humans have, what two consenting adults do is none of my business.  It shouldn't be the basis of discriminating against them.

Having been born in the Global south and currently living in the American South for last three decades, I can say that I have a fair idea about discrimination.  If I were to point out one common root of discrimination, I would pick false exceptionalism.  Based on that simple but painful examples above, I had to admit that there is nothing exceptional about having a particular sexual orientation.  

In my own evolutionary thinking, I thought it was a White culture. But then my friend and colleague Michael Twitty mentioned that he was gay at a keynote address attended in Durham. 

But the hardest and most entrenched bigotry was that it's a western culture. My late friend Binyavanga Wainaina would later announce that he was gay. The late Binyavanga was one of the most brilliant young Kenyan I knew. What was even more amazing was the fact that he had a rare combination of brilliance and a big heart. 

I knew Binyavanga through food mostly but also through activism and intellectual pursuits. I could understand some of the pains, pressures and imperfections that come with a big heart and big heads in light of oppression.  

Part of Binyavanga's problem was that he was a visionary in a barren land. 

I was not surprised to see him on Times Magazine's 2006 list of the 100 most influential people in the world.

My conclusion at the dinner at Granite Farm was that I wish that White Southerners were indeed a superior group of people. But then the poverty and long racial tension in the region, not to mention the historical losses in the civil war can hardly constitute evidence of such superiority. 

I would dare say that if certain sexual orientation makes people superior, let’s tally all the crimes committed by the worst criminals in each of our lives and see if it correlates with their sexual orientation or any other bigotry. 

While I know of only a few gay men and women, I know of even fewer amongst all groups who are morally off the charts.  The few morally straight or at least trying to be straight do not neatly fall on one side of the sexual divide. 

In the end, let us consider that the opportunity cost of oppressing others in fighting against our own oppression.  That is part of the reasons behind poor Whites supporting leaders who consider and treat them like trash. Hell, they even call them as much. In the same light, Africans will shout BLM and boycott White businesses while getting worse treatment at the hands of their wealthy elites and leaders. 

May we take the que and draw our own battle lines. My own promise is that when I draw my battle lines, I will be both honest and steadfast with myself, regardless of the White Gaze and the Black Haze. Racism in a way is like a negative Kora and Blackism is the damaging tune we all innocently hum to ourselves and hence block out the true Kora and the healing memories it carries.

Discomfort Food

Comfort food? What a gimmick! Which food can be both comfortable and unjust to your health at the same time? Here is an example of dishonest food. The plate looks very nice and well decorated but here in lies a bane of unsustainable culture.

This plate you see is a reflection of our failures as a people more than anything else. Think of all the ingredients used to make this plate, the inputs used to grow those ingredient, the capital intensity of the equipments used, the fossil fuel used, the labor used to harvest all the ingredients, the cooks and servers who prepared the food, the cost of the facility and the health outcomes from those who are affected by each and every step of the process all the way to the consumer.

You will quickly realize that there is nothing comfortable about that plate and much of the conventional food we consume. In any case, we will have to ignore all the suffering we cause to other humans, the animal kingdom and the environment. How then can we derive culinary comfort from such impious acts and still hope to be human ? Ours must be food of discontent.

Homage to a Granary

My people traditionally had "Granaries of Ngai" (Ngai is the high deity)dotting the walking highway between villages so that strangers could travel without fear of hunger. That is the only structure that I am aware of that associated with a deity in its name. Granaries were known to be the private property of a family and was respected as such.

 It was therefore a serious crime for anyone to violate the private space insde the granary. My people knew that your stomach was more private than any anatomy below it. There was no cheating around this matter of life and death. You couldn't have that aspect of life wrong. 

They know that is how life had always been and it is unlikely to change any time soon. You can have women in power or men in power and the primacy of food would still remain. The women folk can identify themselves as feminists or "husbands" of other women, as they in fact did practice,  and the primacy of food would remain.

Then the White colonists arrived along with their religious venom.  The buildings that were built by these people was to extract resources for the primary purpose of spreading the very ideology that was damaging their way of life. In other words the new "granaries" were in actually and literally for a deity. This was a great contrast to the traditional public granary whose main focus was the larger community or humanity. The same colonialists called my people primitive.

Over a hundred year later, some of the former colonists have become "primitive "  in regards to the primacy of the stomach. I wonder if the same court would rule that there are grounds of coveting your neighbors wife in case you had issues obtaining sexual favors for whatever reason.

Now it gives me hope that the church will soon or later go "primitive". For I partly take issues with the conceptualization of religion due to it's impact on our stomachs.

But yet some will point an accusing finger at me and claim that I "fight" the church. My fight is not against anyone but for everyone's stomach. The church is dangerous for it's introduction to a concept that consumes so much of our energies for concepts that are geared towards the only life we know during a time when we are in dire need for any energy we can amass to be used in improving those things that we know will make life.

In so many words, paying homage to the granary is my defense against the pantry. The pantry is a symbol of processed food and the granary a mark of sustainable and sovereign food.

Blackism and BLM

To say Black Lives Matter is essentially a philosophical statement first before it is a political statement.  It could be the natural progression from the shortest two-word  proclaimation of Black Power of Kwame Ture and the other vanguards of African freedom struggle of the 1960s. 

Looking back, the statement was a great place to start. Just consider for a minute how difficult it has been even to find an appropriate name for people of African descent in America. 

 How can you solve a problem that you can't define. Africans are indeed a special breed in the eyes of those in power going back to the founding of this country.  Just about everybody else who migrated to U.S were only one step from being full citizens even though some foreigners received derogatory names like the Japanese and the Jews that reflected the prejudices of time. While those prejudices are still around, none is as prevalent as the prejudice against African Americans. 

The term for Africans in America has moved from Africans captives, then to slaves to negro, Colored then to Black and now to African American. This is a clear indication of the tenuous conditions of African lives in the U.S.. The problem has now metastasized into a variety of problems. 

Two are most obvious and pernicious. 

First, the problem is that Americans created the very people that it now consideres as a problem. It is understandable why America would act in such a manner.  You see, Americans were the first to spot black power. The only difference is that they didn't shout or march. 

They took it and converted it into wealth and comfort for themselves. That means that for America to openly believe in Black power in its entirety, they would have to view a large part of their wealth as Black. I I don't need to elaborate why such thinking would be suicide for White America. By the way, this is a great place to remind you that Africans in America is such a problem that their citizenship is the only one that conditional. African Americans are free as long as they are not guilty of a crime.  That is a crime that compounded the original crime. The first crime was to enslave the Africans and them criminalize them after exposing them to severe crime at yout.

Secondly, the African who is in transition and in an extremely distabilized condition only knows black power by proxy. Where is the example of what an African is or was. How erroneous can we be to think that we are such special people, blessed and elect of the most high, after all the suffering we have experienced at the hands of white and arab terror and still be "normal"? That's a cardinal crime. Soldiers go to war nowadays for a few years and have to be treated for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Yet slavery, colonialism and postcolonial stresses are somehow lesser crimes.

It's for this reason I think that Black Lives Matter has to be, by necessity, a philosophical statement.  That would deal with all the exegesis and veracity of what being a captive, slave, negro and so. Only by understanding the complexity of the problem philosophically can we then proceed to deal with necessary political ramification of Black Lives Matter.  

Black Lives Matter as a slogan of protest is more or less a joke. It ignores the fact that making Black lives into something that matter is antithetical to white domination.  As long as the structures of white domination remain intact,  the stars can turn black in support of the Black cause but nothing will change. 

Black lives matter stopped being a truism so that White lives could matter. Do you then think we can march and protest whites lives out of their dominant position? Did white people themselves march their way into power or rather marched around the proverbial wall of Jerico until they found themselves in position of power? History answers that question very clearly. Black people are the poster book example of the cost of White power.

In the exploitation of Africans, three systems had to be designed. The first to break the African system. The second system was to imbue the African with a slave consciousness in order to be a useful tool for creating white power. Thirdly,  a system to keep him distracted and therefore unable to liberate himself from being a tool for the creation of white power.

It's easy to purge those things instituted in the Africans to allow for his and her exploitation. All those things promoted as solutions by those in power can't be useful in our liberation. We can't be free in Jesus, Muhammad or any the other foreign religions. We have to exist outside all those boundary set by the enslavers. If those religions had the power to liberate us and maintain our African systems, the enslavers would have never allowed such religions amongst slaved ancestors.  I have first hand how religion and all other systems of education and institutions of socialization obstruct the creation of African systems.

Don't ask me how I know or why I make such a big deal out of it. The British made my people "Subjects of the queen". Wouldn't it make sense to make our selves the "subject" of Black Lives Matters? 

Let all manner of political science,  philosophy,  rhetoric,  logic, geometry and any other subject make itself amenable as tool to solve this persistent dilema of African suffering and dehumanization.