When I first heard of Kwanza I though it was based on a real African feast or festival of some kind. And I thought, well, I have no interest in celebrating it (not being african) but, okay, sure, whatever.
Then I found out that Kwanza was created by a black college professor at the height of the civil rights movement in the sixties. Now back then, it may have seemed like a great idea. But today, it seems to have no cultural value because it wasn’t ever a part of anyone’s culture. It was a tacked-on symbol to express a feeling of anti-white more than pro-black, i.e. that Christmas was somehow inherently white (and racist).
It reminds me of Mississippi reacting to the start of the civil rights movement in the fifties by putting the stars & bars in their state flag. That obviously had nothing to do with the civil war. It was the whole state saying F-you nggrs! It wasn’t celebrating or promoting southern culture, it was just being anti-black.
My point is that I see celebrating Christmas as being, at least, very American (i.e. inclusive). And I see substituting Kwanza for Xmas (which, after all, is what you’re doing) as being very unamerican (i.e. exclusive).
I don’t celebreate Kwanzaa (or Christmas for that matter)- but here are my thoughts on the matter.
I don’t think its anti-white because Christmas itself isn’t all inclusive…Not all Americans celebrate Christmas. After all, America is supposed to (in theory anyways) honour differences. To reject Christmas isn’t being unAmerican. And even if it is…I don’t see what’s wrong with that. One should have the freedom to reject whatever one wishes.
About Kwanzaa…I don’t think its so much anti-white as it is pro-African. I know Kwanzaa was invented, but that doesn’t make it any less of a holiday. Christmas itself was technically invented- Jesus was actually born in the summertime, right, or so they say?
I quite agree that Kwanzaa is concieved as being pro-African rather than anti-white. Finally, though, I think we must learn to regard our ethnic derivations as irrelevent at best, corrosive and destructive at its worst.
Black folk’s desire to cherish Africa is reasonable enough, I am rather fond of Irish music myself, and am no slouch with a dram. But it means next to nothing. If I were to find out tomorrow morning, ooops, big mistake, turns out your Italian, I still wouldn’t like opera.
Afro-centrism is weird for the same reason: the Bantu were not the Masai, the Zulu were not the Mtwebe. Its rather like white folks suddenly following a “European” celebration. (Well, yes they are, in a way, but Christmas is much more American than Europen)
And it should not be forgotten, though it was a white man who was buying the African slave, it was usually a black man who was selling. I think the African-American owes as much consideration to the birthplace of his ancestors as I do. Which is to say, zilch. Being black doesn’t need a tradition for the same reason a fish doesn’t need a bicycle.
Finally, we must put aside all of our derivations, all our flags, sing no more anthems. Sure, let’s have our Serbian picnics and our St. Swivings Day parades. But please don’t pretend it means anything Let us take our ethnic derivation with the same seriousness we take our NFL affiliation. Let us think towards our grandchildren, rather than our grandparents.
BTW, the following statement’s main premise is wildly inaccurate:
The present Mississippi state flag was adopted in 1894. Perhaps Georgia was meant. It placed the rebel flag on its state flag in 1956.
And a further nitpick- the rebel battle flag on the Mississippi and Georgia state flags is not the stars & bars. The stars and bars was the original Confederate flag- 3 bars of red/white/red with a blue canton containing one star for each secessionist state. See http://fotw.digibel.be/flags/us-csa1.html
I would be very interested to hear your feelings on gay pride day (or maybe I wouldn’t). After all, that was a “created” holiday too, to bring together a particular oppressed group of people. And unless it’s at the end of June, you can’t really argue that it’s commemorating anything.
So, let’s have it. If Kwanzaa is racist, does that mean that Gay Pride Day is heterophobic?
If there is nothing to be ashamed of, there is nothing to be proud of! I don’t sit around the house trying to instruct my children in the subtleties of peckerwood philosophy.
(One of my funniest memories, when I was working at the local veggie co-op, when one year all the Nigerian students were showing up at the U(niversity). And you would see them in the local bar late at night, trying to talk like American blacks. Hysterical. Funniest thing you ever saw.)
I think that, at the very least, implicit in Kwaanza is the claim that Christmas is racist. Not celebrating Christams is one thing. But going out of one’s way to reject it is quite another. It’s like the difference between not singing the national anthem, and loudly singing the British national anthem while everyone else is singing the American one.
I consider any holiday created to puff up the ego of and to act as essentially race specific to be racist. Kwanzaa arrive right on the back of Ebonics.
It is one thing to have genuine religious holidays, based in centuries of belief and another to suddenly find, or create one whose main purpose for being is to shore up the lagging self image of a race while promoting separation from the other races. Sure, any race may celebrate Kwanzaa, but it is a black holiday, created by blacks, originally celebrated in Africa by some tribes as a harvest time, now elevated to quasi-religious status, altered to provide more ritual and color and to encompass basically the feeling (?), assurance (?), that blacks have something of *their[i/] own.
Something like the distorted mess that is the belief system of the Nation of Islam, which encompasses a little bit of Moslem religion and a whole mess of anti-white doctrine created to fit it. Actual Muslims do not recognize the NOI.
Gay Pride day, is not a religious holiday, with a doctrine designated it elevate it to such stature. It’s more like a celebration of self and is not racist, has no set of ritual-like rules. It’s more or less like Marti Gras (sp).
The way I look at it, I figure the black race would probably be better off by not trying to create black specific things and just concentrate on being part of the homogenous whole that is the nation and the world in general. Instead of creating quasi religious holidays and interpretive systems for mangled language, concentrate on education, pride of self accomplishment, discourage street tongue, enforce acceptable leadership in the communities and stop elevating criminal behavior or racist attitudes as things to be emulated.
Your example is of a person who is interfering with the actions of others. A person celebrating Kwanza isn’t interfering with somebody else celebrating Christmas, any more than a person celebrating Hanukkah or a person celebrating nothing at all is. So what if they want to reject a holiday that they don’t feel represents them?
Why does every single activity by any Americans with dark skin become a threat to some other group of Americans with lighter skin??
Kwanzaa is not substituted for Christmas!
Among that group of black Americans who celebrate Kwanzaa (which is not a majority of that population), you will note that Kwanzaa begins the day after Christmas, specifically so that the two celebrations do not conflict.
I suspect that Kwanzaa gets far more recognition on the local TV reports, each year, than it does within the black community, but even if every black in the U.S. was fully participating in it, the overwhelming majority of blacks still celebrate Christmas. (There is a sizable group Muslims in the black commuinity (outside the NOI), but there is no indication that they use Kwanzaa to insult Christmas (if they celebrate Kwanzaa at all).)
If you really believe in Christmas, then go home and celebrate it and try to remember some of its key phrases:
We’ll have to inform the black race of your enlightened opinions. I’m sure they’ll be most appreciative. Those crazy black folks have had the darnedest figuring out how to be mainstream. Clearly they’ve just been mixed up on their priorities… :rolleyes:
Why on earth does anyone care what holidays someone else celebrates? (Even more importantly, why does anyone care if someone doesn’t celebrate Christmas?) Who are you to tell people what to take pride in, or what traditions are valid?
How did you arrive at this conclusion? I don’t know if you realize this, but black Americans in general are very religious. The Christian blacks celebrate Christmas with as much piouness as the next guy. There is no either/or implied in Kwanzaa. And if you, as a presumably white person, want to celebrate Kwanzaa there is no rule against it.
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If you want to equate the celebration of unity, faith, self-determination, purpose, responsibility and co-operative economics to white people saying fuck you nigger, then feel free to do so. It’s not right, but, hey, it’s a free country.
Again, I’ll reiterate: Kwanzaa was not made up to replace Christmas. It was made up in a time when this country was telling it’s black citizens that they were not equal, could even not sit down and eat with it’s white citizens, and that blacks where second class in every way.
I’ll also state again for the record: Anyone can celebrate Kwanzaa if they feel so inclined. Not many blacks celebrate Kwanzaa, but if you feel the need to intergrate the festivities, there is nothing to stop you.
I think that’s a good point, Elucidator. Someone else brought up a similar point on another thread (It was about “What’s wrong with being white and proud of it?”). That is, you can’t really celebrate being white because that’s not a nationality. It’s (barely) a skin color. Similarly, being African is the same. Its a huge continent, with differences of language and climate.
It is an invented holiday, true, but its more important to celebrate whats behind the holiday itself. Lots of non-Christians recognize the ideals of Christmas…coming together, uniting, etc. Its better, IMO, to celebrate people, or important ideas (family, friends, peace, whatnot…) than it is to celebrate your ethnicity or gender or sexual orientation. That is, we’re all free to honour those things, but these things should go deeper than one’s nationality…
I’m surprised we haven’t had any of the radical free-market advocates on this board point out the REAL problem with Kwanzaa – one of the themes of the holiday (a theme each day, IIRC) is “ujamaa”, which is usually translated as the wishy-washy “cooperative economics” but which can also be easily translated as “socialism.” :eek:
I, of course, have heard of Kwanzaa, but I guess I am unfamiliar with who is going to celebrate it? I mean, if you are black is that enough? Or is it supposed to be if you can trace your roots back to the African Continent? Or are you supposed to believe in something more? I am not much in favor of anything that tends to separate people based on simply on race. Is this the case, or is it cultural? Or is it race disguised as culture?
Why then, when it was created, was it set on Dec. 26? If it isn’t intended to be an alternative to Christmas, then why isn’t it in August, a month just begging for a holiday?
How is Christmas inclusive? By it’s very nature, celebrating the birth of Christ as the Messiah, it is exclusive. It excludes non-Christians.
So Kwanzaa was invented. So what? To non-Christians, Christmas is a made up holiday celebrating the birth of some dead guy. Almost all holidays are ‘made up’ at one time or another.
OK, so Kwanzaa was invented during the height of the Civil Rights era. Was it supposed to have an expiration date? If so, when? December 1985? How about in 1990? Oh wait, I know, in 1994! Yeah, that’s it… :rolleyes: The Black community wants desperately to relate back to their heritage. Being robbed of that luxury, many just relate back to the continent as a whole. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s probably much easier for you to trace your country of origin than it is for me to trace mine.
And finally, your claim that Kwanzaa is un-American. Oh my! So should we do away with Saint Patrick’s Day? That holiday celebrates a man who felt it was his duty to go back to Ireland and convert the Celtic people to the Christian religion. And that dude certainly wasn’t American. It, also by it’s very nature, is exclusive, too. And March as National Women’s History Month? We’ve got to end this sexist practice now! I mean it’s too close to Easter!
Just because something doesn’t center around White males doesn’t mean it’s racist.
This sounds so paranoid to me. Are white people really this threatened by Kwanzaa? Why pick December 26th? Maybe because most blacks are already in a festive mood because of Christmas. Maybe it was Dr. Karenga’s wife’s birthday.
Anyone can celebrate the holiday. ANYONE. If you want to celebrate the 6 principles and you are white the race police will not arrest you.
I do not celebrate Kwanzaa. It does not fit into my busy Christmas schedule, but I drink lot of green beer on St. Patrick’s Day and the race police have never carted me away.
Why are you so threatened by a holiday? The white people in this thread who believe Kwanzaa is racist don’t seem to have a problem with Columbus Day, or Polish National Pride Day, or any other day. . . so long as it’s not for or about black people. Black people have to learn to blend in with white folks, according to a few here on this thread.
**Jetassisted **is under the impression that to celebrate one culture is to put down another. Again, I see this irrational fear of black folk having a holiday that white folks can’t join. This isn’t true, but, why is that so scary to you?
The Ryan can be excused only in that he seems not to know what Kwanzaa is about. But the fear of a black holiday can be heard in his words.
Hail Ants seems to be under the same misconceptions as The Ryan. The refrain being *aren’t our holidays good enough for black people? Why do they have to go around making up their own? *
Let me put all the people who fear Kwanzaa at ease. Very, very few people celebrate it. I don’t personally know a single black person who does. So you can all relax now.
Maybe so. I do not feel threatened by Kwanzaa. I don’t know a single person that celebrates it and I am neither Christian nor a Jew. However, Kwanzaa is a recently created afro-centric holiday, the brainchild of a Black Studies professor, brought about during a time of greater racial and political strife. Black Muslims in the 60’s were known to specifically reject Christianity as “the religion of the oppressor,” and much of the angry rhetoric of the time included messages of separatism. For whatever reason, Kwanzaa was set the very day after the largest holiday of the year. Why? If it is not intended to be a possible alternative to Christmas, then why the coincidence of scheduling? It certainly seems to suggest to a great many people that Kwanzaa is intended to be an alternative, protestations to the negative notwithstanding. While the scheduling may have been completely innocent, it seems reasonable to think that Dr. Karena may have had an additional agenda given the sociopolitical climate of the time.