I find this whole focus on Black History a bit tiring. Every year we see documentaries and movies that feature the hardship the black race has endured at the hands of the white man. In a sense, it seems to put blame on the white man for the predicament of the black race.

I am also peeved with the context, and apparent intent of featuring successful black individuals, as if the success had anything to do with one's skin pigmentation. Our problem is with politicians who instead of seriously investing in Jamaicans, have diabolically kept them ignorant to exploit them. We also have a problem with artistes who are crass, crude and callous, and who have a worrying impact on our young. I don't see the white man here.

Focus on our blackness

This need to focus on our blackness does make it a white man's world, because to accentuate our blackness is a response, in kind, to the bigotry of white supremacists. I believe that makes us bigots. Are we saying that the colour of our skin determines our passions, our dreams, our motivations?

This thing of race is a social construct, and to the extent that we define ourselves along such lines, we shackle ourselves with the limitations determined by the chief architects and engineers of racial classification. I will further suggest that even when we protest and refute the views postulated by the antagonist, we seem to be pathetically begging for recognition and a respectful place in "their world". So one way or the other, we are playing their game.

I don't think we should dignify this bigotry with the decency of a response. Let's stop being blacks or whites, or ... and let's just be people who are free to dream our dreams, and pursue them with passion and purpose.

I am, etc.

CHARLES EVANS

charock01@yahoo.com