CHAPTER 2-THE DESTINATION-CO EDITED BY J.B.N.

European slave traders thought they could take the Africans right to America to work right away. As they found that was quite wrong with some of hardest, toughest tribesman from Africa. They were not easy to tame and catch at any point during slavery. For them it was worth a try because they were desperate. Remember the indentured servants of the colonists and explorers were already freed from work. It is estimated that over 80-90% of Native Americans had died off so there was no one to help farm and cultivate the new Americas as the New world settlers tried to have them do.

Europeans thought Africans would be easy to break and enslave, but that was far from the case. The 1st Africans who were enslaved were from the Roman and Greek wars of the B.C. era and mid evil times. They sometimes were outcasts of warring African tribes and they had heart, passion and were ruthless warriors. They often rebelled against their enslavers and sometimes committed suicide on the boats or when they arrived. Europeans had an idea to break their spirit. They would break the trip up and planned drop offs, pick-ups, cargo refueling and then created slave trade ports from Europe to the West Indies islands.

Perhaps you have been to the West Indies, Jamaica, St Kits, St, Canary Islands , St. Andrew and Santo Domingo and wondered why the people are so dark?, or the people look more black skinned? Also there is often funny accent to us we hear but not funny at all when we learn their origins. It is a mix of European and African dialects and languages. The Caribbean islands were the slave ports where slaves were broken in and taught how to be a slave. In order to teach someone something you either have to start from scratch when someone is young or wipe everything out and re boot their thinking and habits; and that is what was done. Africans were not allowed to use their native language, talk the native tongue and slang, use their own names, or worship their native religions.

We still see that today, as most African Americans are Christian, and have Christian names. My grandmother named my uncles and aunts English or Spanish names: Glenn, Leon, Barbra, and Mark. My parents did the same as brothers are named Brent Chad, and Dorian. But we all have English middle names, Boyd, Winston, Demar and Vincent. I am named after my father, my name is little odd which I will detail later.

Occasionally you will see many blacks have some French names since the French was were one of the 1st countries to respect the African American culture and people. Monique, Dominique, Louis have been popular names with blacks. The French also help explore and settle some of the southern and Midwest states and cities of the south such as New Orleans and other parts of the Deep South. Actually the city where I was born Peoria, the state Illinois, and the city I grew up in Moline were French settlements. The French helped settle and explore the Missipippi river area and even owned a few states before selling them back to America congress. The French got along well with the Native Americans and

Remember slaves were broken in first in the islands, then brought to the states. Their kids were taken and re taught the American slave culture. If you always thought and were taught you were a slave you know nothing different then the bad cycle repeats itself. Generations of African Americans grew up and died thinking and knowing they were meant to be a slave and nothing will or would change that. They forgot who they were and where they came from. They were forbid to practice their culture, religion, and language for centuries.

That was the game changer in the American slave trade was the calculated and systematic plan to erase and eradicate the African culture. We read in the Bible that even the Hebrew slaves were allowed to speak Hebrew and worship their Gods and prophets. Pharaoh and Egyptians did not make the Hebrews speak Egyptian and nor make them worship their many Gods such as Horus, Seth, Ra, or Osiris.

Same story goes for most of us Afro –Americans. My family knows our Native American culture pretty well and not our African culture. In 2017, I researched my ancestry.com and found out my/our major gene markers. I found out we were 25% Cameroon /Congo, 22% Nigerian, 16% Ivory coast- Ghana, 11% Mali, and 26% other. We knew the other genes to be Irish and Native American /Choctaw. The African side makes much sense to us since some of these countries have very tall people and some of the most stubborn and passionate people. My family has those same traits from the African side and we knew about our Irish slave owner and the Native American sides.

We have to understand Slaves were not allowed to read and write, again a vast difference in any other slavery system in world history. Henceforth now for over 400 years there is huge segment of the black population that were created semi or fully illiterate. Most African Americas in grade school, Jr, and high school have a lesser reading, mathematical and comprehension/grammar level than their white class mates. But let us understand it is based on English comprehension not overall comprehension. Very similar or even lower to other minorities such as Latin/ Mexican. I argue that their/our brains are under a severe form of confusion due to 400 years of learning the English language second hand. We as blacks often learned by sound or speaking but not by learning it by a true teaching method we teach in schools today and then. Remember blacks were not permitted to attend normal white schools until the 1960’s. We often make exceptions for Latinos and Asians as an ESL, [English as a second language] but not for African Americans because we are deemed American lol]. Can you really not teach a race of people to read and write and send them to sub-par school systems and expect them to compete versus the privileged educated people in this country? Then hold them to the same academic standards as whites or other races who aren’t even American?

To make matters worse, then penalize blacks under the ACT and SAT standardized test system. Then hold us/them out of college sports because they can’t read, write, or understand math concepts like white America. Isn’t that a little condescending? We push African Americans to sports, build them up when they do well and then when they can’t measure up academically we take that away from them? Hmmm. Remember, we were brought to this country to work and procreate, compete, work longer and stronger than normal humans. Not to study and be held to an academic standard of our masters and traders. Again when we’re not academic we get penalized. HMMMM, by athletically.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not agreeing with their system and scale. We as black people in America should not sell out and abandon being held to academic standards and just be allowed to play sports with no standards. We seldom know the success rate for kids to play college and pro ball is around .0004% at best. Those stats are for the big 3 or 4 sports such as football, men’s and women’s basketball and baseball and softball.

I want to mention the problem and issue white America has created when they bred and encouraged our race of people to play work the fields 1st and later to play sports. To penalize them when they don’t measure up to those academic standards of your white race is wrong. Some black leaders and scholars would argue that these are Jim Crow laws in high school and college.

For most blacks, the art of dance movement and repetitive skill work was our bread and butter during slavery and sharecropping. Some of it is genetic but doing the same thing each day, with 10-15 hour days in the fields, 6 days a week, for most of the year often breeds a muscle pattern or motor skills that are not natural but can be passed on. If you pick cotton, tobacco, shuck corn, butcher meat, prepare meals, and clean equipment year after year imagine the fine tune motor skills a person would learn and master. That is also called practice and work ethic in the sports world. Often that is what recruiters, coaches and G.M upper management look for in athletes, correct? How long will the black highly skilled athlete practice. Will they will practice each and every day, and will they do it under grueling circumstances, sick, not feeling well, or bad or sub-par conditions? Sound familiar to the parallel to slavery? Why is practice so important to coaches, why do they want players to practice long hours and seldom give breaks and water or time off?

When I was in college in my 1st 3 years, there was no limit to practice times and limits. Not until my junior...