"As much as I definitely enjoy solitude/I wouldn't mind perhaps/spending little time with you" - Björk, Possibly Maybe (Post)
Cobb is keeping a close eye on President Bush's time in Africa:
There's not much we can expect in 5 days, and I am beginning to believe that a significant portion this junket is for the benefit of [African-]American audiences.Which seems pretty accurate considering today's speech:
"Human beings were delivered, sorted, weighed, branded with marks of commercial enterprises and loaded as cargo on a voyage without return," Bush said. "One of the largest migrations in history was also one of the greatest crimes of history." Bush did not apologize for slavery but noted Americans throughout history "clearly saw this sin and called it by name." "For 250 years, the captives endured an assault on their culture and their dignity. The spirit of Africans in America did not break," Bush said. "Yet the spirit of their captors was corrupted. Small men took on the powers and airs of tyrants and masters. Years of unpunished brutality and bullying and rape produced a dullness and hardness of conscience."
Which is all fine and good. What bothers me, what always bothers me when most politicians, actually when many white people in general, talk about the crimes of slavery they do so in a way that distances themselves from the crime. I hold no quarrel with Bush and his HIV/AIDS initiative towards Africa and his push to foster economic growth in the democratic nations of the continent, it's quite the progressive policy for a republican president. I just think my gag reflex and bullshit meter wouldn't go off so strongly if somebody, anybody, would just add a little, "These crimes were done by Americans, some of whom were my ancestors...it pains me that that is in my history..." etc. etc. etc.
What it always feels like to me is that while I always know my ancestors were slaves at some time, the slave masters, the slavers, the captors, and everyone else involved were these mysterious white people that have no connection to white people today. And believe me, I understand that so many of our current American population came over in boats in the late 1800s and early 1900s and thus had little direct connection with slavery in America. I get that. The fact remains, though, that somebody's white great great great granddaddy owned some big black bucks.
I'm just saying a little recognition of that would make all this rhetoric sound a little more genuine.