Black Psychology 101: "Exploring the Anti-Black Mindset"
Mba Mbulu, Instructor
Copyright 1998, 1999, 2016, 2020 ASET, M. Mbulu All rights to everything on this web site are reserved.

Class 3

Read the information that follows. In order to benefit the most from this course, you must constantly keep the following points in mind and refer to them frequently: (1) 50 years after the writing of Black Skin, White Masks, Black People in the United States still perceive of their potential and capabilities within an unnaturally or abnormally limited context. (2) The psychological molding of Black People predisposes the best educated among Us to be anti-Black: anti-Black nationalism, anti-Black centric, anti-Black whatever. (3) In addition to being victims of racism, Black People in the United States demonstrate all of the qualities of a people who have been victimized by colonialism.

Lesson 3 will concentrate on excerpts from Chapter 3 of Black Skin, White Masks. Think about the following issues as you study and learn.
(1) When bad decisions are made under extremely stressful conditions, are the consequences of those decisions substantially altered?
(2) The term ontology refers to how a people view life, its processes and its purpose. How can that be a source of support when one group of people come into contact with other groups of people?

[Home][BlackPsychology101][BuyBooks][AsetUniversityEntrance]

Chapter 5 "The Fact of Blackness" [Audio Version]

A. p. 140 The Negro is a toy in the white man's hands
It is because Black People bought into the white lie that white power can play with Black People [treat Black People as "toys"]. Because Black People bought into the white lie, Black People are "in the white man's hands." The simple solution is to reject the white lie. It is a simple solution that has been difficult to implement because: [p.110] The Black man has no ontological resistance in the eyes of the white man...
When Black individuals come face to face with white power and white standards, Black individuals tend to assume the superiority of white standards. This assumption is evidence of an inferiority complex. Why does it exist? Because Black individuals have "no ontological resistance" to support them, no customs and sources to lean on for support. According to Fanon [p.110], Black People's "customs and the sources on which they were based were wiped out."
Were Black People's customs and standards wiped out, or were they abandoned? The answer to this question reveals the origin of the inferiority complex. When Black People stopped responding to white oppression in a completely Black context is when Blacks began to lose their ontological resistance. When Black People stopped responding to white oppression in a completely Black context is when Black customs and standards began to lose their force and influence. When Black People stopped responding to white oppression in a completely Black context, Black People became vulnerable and the inferiority complex was made possible.
As a result of abandoning his own, the Black is left without a backbone, without a healthy leg to stand on. Thus:
[p.134] ...it is not I [Blackness] who make a meaning for myself, but it is the meaning that was already there, pre-existing, waiting for me. By failing to respond to oppression within a Black context, Black People abandoned the ability to continue defining themselves. From that point on, Black People became what others imagined them to be and what others accused them of being. The Black meaning that had been there since the beginning of time, the Black meaning that pre-existed the arrival of white people was obscured and covered up by late arriving white meanings that would predetermine what Black was to mean from then on.
As a result of abandoning his own, the Black has an inferiority complex, and it is because of the inferiority complex that the Black individual [p.139] "responds to the world's anticipation." How can a person or a group of people maintain a balanced psyche when their worth depends on their ability to anticipate and fulfill the impossible expectations of hostile foreigners? The answer! They can't--- and the extent to which they try is the extent to which they have been psychologically bruised. [Top]

[#4][Home][BlackPsychology101][BuyBooks][AsetUniversityEntrance]