A friend and I had an extensive conversation in which I literally forced him to agree that racism had a hand in the original plan of slavery. We had time on our hands, and we were high from shoving down what would later turn into poop. We were bursting with a raw desire to toss around ideas. His main argument was that slavery had economic and political backing. Yes, but racism too, a desire to portray the superiority of one race over the other….That too! I screamed!
Who cares?!
So, when he mentioned this book, I was drawn immediately to its title. Among many things, How To Make a Slave. Okay, let’s go see what this literature held!
This material is simply a letter from Willie Lynch (whose last name is asserted to probably be the source of the word lynching ) to slave owners on how to keep their slaves from rebelling for a long time, (He promises them that if used well, this method could work for 300 years from the 18th century in which it was shared) Though I think this material aligns perfectly with some happenings in our world today, it is believed to be a hoax. Yet, it is written in such logical detail that it makes me believe it is ‘real’. The more I think about it, the more my conviction of an existence of what I like to call ‘workings behind happenings’. The fact that there’s always some twisted plot behind occurrences. Ebola, shootings of young black males in America,….Whether true or not, it is striking material that deserves attention.
This piece would highlight striking portions of the document while briefly discussing opinion on how it aligns with modern social happenings (largely in my Ghanaian society).
‘Use of fear, envy, and distrust for control’ (As a method to control slaves)
Excerpt
‘You must use the dark skin slaves vs. the light skin slaves, and the light skin slaves vs. the dark skin slaves. You must use the female vs. the male. And the male vs. the female. You must also have your white servants and overseers distrust all Blacks.’
Opinion
The social consciousness of pride associated with our black skin is growing, at least online, because of posts that demonstrate this, particularly on an online social space such as Instagram; however, how and why has there generally been a subtle preference for lighter skinned people women? Without any research, a cursory glance at my Ghanaian society, for example, presents anyone with a huge prevalence of lightening products. Lighter skin girls seem to be preferred by ‘society’ and playful accolades such as ‘Akosombo Kaniya’ (Ghana’s electric power source) is thrown around playfully hinting at the underlying thought of the lighter skin girl being preferable to the darker skinned one. Why would such a metaphor exist if it doesn’t hint at the superiority of a lighter skin tone? To compare a source of electricity of a whole country to a person renders that person quite powerful. Moving on, terms like ‘mi broni’ my ‘white babe’ (if you like) are terms of endearment some Ghanaian men use on their women. What does the use of ‘broni’ allude to? or bring to mind?
Excerpt
‘You must also have your white servants and overseers distrust all Blacks. It is necessary that your slaves trust and depend on us. They must love, respect and trust only us. Gentlemen, these kits are your keys to control. Use them. Have your wives and children use them, never miss an opportunity. If used intensely for one year, the slaves themselves will remain perpetually distrustful of each other’.
Opinion
Why do we seem to prefer doing business with Obroni versus another black man? In Chimamanda’s Americanah, she alludes briefly to one of the characters’ prosperity in business if only the face of his business is a person of Caucasian descent. This mentality is demonstrated further by the general preference of western products on our markets. Which is why the West (including people who trace their heritage back to Africa) can get the Shea butter, Cocoa, Angelina/Dashiki and Ghana- must-go and recently our Ahenema slippers repackage it for us, and we still buy…..
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The Dashiki/Angelina cloth being a whole new conversation because do we own them technically if we don’t make them? We can argue that we do own them because they’ve been adapted to our tastes over the years and also because we have embraced and use them….
The other interpretation of distrust can be the encouragement of the use of the colonizer’s language versus our own languages. Slaves were beaten forced to speak English and not their languages so that in doing that, plots and attempts to escape would be eliminated. Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing is a great novel that features several examples to back this example. Check out the post here
The rest of the post features other parts of the letter that struck me. Yet, my commentary ends at these two points. I made a concluding remark at the base of this post and added a video I think sits well with the theme of this post….enjoy…
Other excerpts
‘Let us make a slave. What do we need? First of all, we need a black nigger man, a pregnant nigger woman, and her baby nigger boy. Second, we will use the same basic principle that we use in breaking a horse, combined with some more sustaining factors.’ What we do with horses is that we break them from one form of life to another that is we reduce them from their natural state in nature. Whereas nature provides them with the natural capacity to take care of their offspring, we break that natural string of independence from them and thereby create a dependency status, so that we may be able to get from them useful production for our business and pleasure
‘Hence both the horse and the nigger must be broken; that is breaking them from one form of mental life to another. Keep the body take the mind!’
You must keep your eye and thoughts on the female and the offspring of the horse and the nigger. A brief discourse in offspring development will shed light on the key to sound economic principles. Pay little attention to the generation of original breaking, but concentrate on future generations.
The Breaking Process of the African Woman
‘Take the female and run a series of tests on her to see if she will submit to your desires willingly. Test her in every way, because she is the most important factor for good economics. If she shows any sign of resistance in submitting completely to your will, do not hesitate to use the bull whip on her to extract that last bit of resistance out of her. Take care not to kill her, for in doing so, you spoil good economic. When in complete submission, she will train her off springs in the early years to submit to labor when they become of age. Understanding is the best thing. Therefore, we shall go deeper into this area of the subject matter concerning what we have produced here in this breaking process of the female nigger. We have reversed the relationship in her natural uncivilized state she would have a strong dependency on the uncivilized nigger male, and she would have a limited protective tendency toward her independent male offspring and would raise male offsprings to be dependent like her. Nature had provided for this type of balance. We reversed nature by burning and pulling a civilized nigger apart and bull whipping the other to the point of death, all in her presence. By her being left alone, unprotected, with the male image destroyed, the ordeal caused her to move from her psychological dependent state to a frozen independent state. In this frozen psychological state of independence, she will raise her male and female offspring in reversed roles. For fear of the young males life, she will psychologically train him to be mentally weak and dependent, but physically strong. Because she has become psychologically independent, she will train her female off springs to be psychological independent. What have you got? You’ve got the nigger women out front and the nigger man behind and scared.’ …….
Conclusion
‘Keep the body take the mind!’
The slavery that took the body and human effort ended long ago yet mental slavery continues to exist. Though the term ‘mental slavery’ sounds so overused and bloated, it still very much exists and is a term that should be revisited often and put in perspective. Ignoring the elephant in the room because we are more concerned with our individual lives instead of going to war for the greater good of the race or mankind is expected, however, talking about issues at the barest minimum will provoke thought, trigger conversation and gradually bring change. as seen on our social media pages …
Lynch, Willie. ‘How to make a slave’
Click to access The_Willie_Lynch_Letter_The_Making_Of_A_Slave!.pdf
Also, watch this video! It’s worth the watch!
Rosa Armstrong 