FEBRUARY 26, 1969
THE VOICE
PAGE 3
FSC Students Attend Black
Conference
V
LetterTo The Editor
Editor, THE VOICE
Fayetteville State College
January 24, 1969
Fayetteville State Col
lege Student Government,
Vice President Mercer
Anderson and student
Stanford I’ucker attended
the “Towards A Black
University Conference”
in Washington, D. C.
Many of you will wonder
why this conference was
held and what the results
were,
“The function of
education in any society is
to acculturate the younger
members of the society:
it instills in them a cer
tain idea of the life they
should live.
The concept of a Black
University is revolu
tionary. It emerges out
of the frustrations of
Black students, educa
tors, activists and com
munity leaders who rec
ognize that the present
institutions of higher
learning have no rele
vance to the total Black
community and who
realize the contradiction
of allowing themselves
to be acculturated into
a society which debil-
ates Black people.
The Black University
must help to build a new
social structure by pro
viding its students with a
viable alternative to the
status quo and the free
dom to create values, life
styles and norms which
can be perpetuated.
The Black University
should not separate Black
people. Its primary con
cern should be towards
revolutionary unity and
excellence in a Black
society.
Our responsibility as
conference participants
was to define the
structure and mechanics
of that university.”
Listed below are some
of the remarks of Brother
Stokely Carmichael and
one of our most dynamic
and articulate brothers,
Maulara Ron Karenga,
Chairman and founder of
US in Los Angeles, Cali
fornia:
“EDUCATION BEFORE
DESTRUCTION”
CARMICHAEL REPORT
More than 1,900 people crowded Cramton Auditorium to hear Stokely Carmichael
deliver the opening address of the “Towards a Black University” conference.
It was a night worth remembering. Not so much that keynote speaker Stokely
Carmichael emphasized the need for an education which develops human beings
rather than technology. Not so much, either, that, although the seven panelists
held varying views as to what a Black education should be, they nevertheless
agreed on the need for such a thing.
Rather, it was the warmth one felt as one rubbed shoulders NOT with one’s
adversaries from across the nation — and across the oceans — but with “those
of us who have been dehumanized.”
To Brother Carmichael, education became an instrument to provide the means
for the production of the basic needs of a society — food, shelter, and clothing.
It should also preserve the basic values of that society.
“Africa has all the resources for survival,” he said. That should have been
the key-note to his lecture on international revolution, delivered for the 11/2 hours
without resorting for a single second to the emotional tactics familiarly associated
with this Black firebrand,
“Black people are colonized.” He had first promised to speak very softly,
and he kept his promise throughout. Colonialism has the unfortunate tendency of
making its victims hate themselves and not the common adversary according to
Carmichael.
That self-hate psyche must be undone, he emphasized. There are two ways to
do this.
One way is through entertainment, “when we make fun of the oppressor because
of fear,” he said. This is necessary, but is, nevertheless, insufficient because
it only relieves the inferiority complex, but does not obliterate self-hatred.
“For today’s student, there is no time for partying and entertainment,” said
Carmichael. Black Students must therefore move into the second phase of the
decolonization process.
The second, the educational process, requires the students to analyze the
situation. This to Carmichael is the hardest part, and there is not enough time.
Black people won’t be allowed any more of these seminars, he believed.
There are three concepts to the educational process. First, “Black people
must have an undying love for our people,” he said. To put on an Afro and then
shout “get the nigger Uncle Tom” is not being ready, as most militants seem to
think, he said. “Honkies created Uncle Toms,” he added. To be ready Is to be
willing to live, to fight, and kill for one’s own people, not only because one hates
white people,” he emphasized.
“Every negro is a potential Black man,” is the second theme in the educational
process. “I was a negro once,” Carmichael confessed.
Although a negro helps contribute to a society which oppresses him, he still
remains a potential Black man because those who purport to be ready are in the
minority, he added. His contention was that because we live in the same con
ditions, negroes will necessarily come round some time.
“We cannot say, ‘I’m not going to talk to a negro,” he said. “My mother is
more of a revolutionary than I am, because she has suffered more.”
The third educational concept centered upon “Black people as a community,
which is not only the idea of land, but our people and wherever they are.” There
fore, Black nationalism is necessary he concluded.
As such, the minority complex which the white man created must be broken
down by internationalising the concept, thus bringing the white man into a minority
position.
Omega's
1968
Honorees
Fayetteville State Col
lege graduate and under
graduate chapters of
Omega Fsi Phi Fra
ternity, Inc. named Dr,
George Butler “Omega
Citizen of the Year”, and
Dr. Odell Uzzell, "Ome
ga Man of the Year”.
The awards were made
during the Omega’s “Na
tional Achievement
Week” program held re
cently. Bernice Lewis
Rationale of
Ron Karenga
Black people have got to start believing that what
you’re going to hear is more Important than what you’re
going to say, ‘cause you already know what you’re
going to say. You’ve said it 500 times.
MAN
Man is only man in a philosophy class or a biology
lab. In the world he is African, Asian or South Ameri
can, He is Chinese making a cultural revolution, or
an Afro-American with soul. He lives by bread and
butter, enjoys red beans and rice or watermelon and
ice cream.
Dear Sir:
Unfortunately, sports reporting in the VOICE is often
something less than accurate. The pre-Christmas
issue contained a note that five seniors were lost to
the football team by graduation, to wit: Danny Mc-
Millian, Lester Brown, Wilbur Jones, Dwight Thomas,
and Charles Lane. Not mentioned were Desmond
Larrier, Macon Mahomes, and Walter Pierce.
Larrier was a regular offensive guard and center in
1964 and 1967 and was switched to defense last fall.
The same jinx that has attended Mahomes throughout
his college career caught with him in the 1968 cam
paign just as it did in his freshman year in 1964. In
both of these years, he sustained injuries in the first
game of the season that kept him out for the rest of the
year. In between he was first string defensive back
on the 1966 and 1967 teams but was counted upon to go
both ways last year. Hence his loss was a crippling
blow to both the offense and defense, especially since
the other starting defensive halfback, Melvin Lane,
likewise was eliminated for the season in the first
game, while Vance Sutphln, who was counted upon as
an offensive starter, withdrew from college before
the season began.
However what contributed most to the lack of
success last autum indubitably was the injury sustained
by Pierce in the scrimmage game against North
Carolina College. This totally unnecessary affair kept
Pierce, who was first-string quarterback, from getting
in a minute of playing time all year. Also hurt in
this scrimmage was Marion Stephens who was first-
string center until this time. He didn’t play again
until the final game of the season. In other words,
the starting quarterback-center combination and most
of the offensive and defensive backfields never had a
chance to function at all last fall. The situation was
rendered worse by the injury sustained by Dwight
Thomas in the Livingston game which kept him out
for the rest of the year.
Most of these misfortunes could have been avoided
had the college been able to raise $700 to cover the
expenses of bringing Knoxville College here to re
place Morris which didn’t bother to notify us that they
were dropping football. Had we been able to fill the
Sept. 28 date left open by Morris’ cancellation, the
expedition to Durham would have been unnecessary.
As it was, it appeared advisable to give the boys a
taste of some kind of action since to wait from Sept. 1
until Oct. 5 to play is a strain most clubs can’t stand.
Sincerely yours,
S. Guldescu
HUMANITY
Everyone in the Black World has been so concerned
with humanity that they have forgotten about them
selves, they can do nothing for humanity.
We say “Negroes” are suffering from “mass in
sanity”. Any man who burns his hair, bites his lips,
or bleaches his skin, has got to be insane.
HEROES
Blacks must develop their own heroic images. To
the white boy, Garvey was a failure—to us he was per
fect for his time and context. To the white boy, Mal
colm X was a hate teacher—to us he was the highest
form of Black Manhood in his generation.
Money is not the answer to the problem unless you
have a value for spending it. There are some Negro
millionaires but they ain t benefiting us. WHY? No
values.
INDIVIDUALISM
There is no such thing as individualism, we’re all
Black. The only thing that saved us from being lynched
like Emmett Till or shot down like Medgar Evers was
not our economics or social status, but our absence.
We don’t need anymore street corner philosophers.
We don’t need any individualist that work out of con
tributing in their own way and it hasn’t no need yet.
It’s about time we had a collective effort and move
on that.
Black People aren’t superior or inferior to one
another but complimentary. We are all on the same
level but in different categories.
Culture is the basis of all ideas, images and
actions. To move is to move culturally, i.e., by set
of values given to you by your culture.
The seven criteria for culture are:
1. Mythology 2. History 3. Social Organization
4. Political Organization 5. Economic Organization
6. Creative Motif 7. Ethos
Nationalism doesn’t come in a day, it doesn’t come in
a week, or amonth, notevenayear-it takes a lifetime.
You have to learn to defend Nationalism anyway it’s
challenged. If it’s verbally—run it down; it will be
intellectually uptight; if it’s physical—fall out and duke
a little.
The Senvenfold path of the Blackness is to Think
Black, Talk Black, Act Black, Create Black, Buy
Black, Vote Black, and Live Black.