Why Would An African American Choose To Live On The Conservative "Plantation"?

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"Yes, Massahs! I will say whatever it take to get ya to like a black man!"

An ongoing enigma in the political- economic sphere is why any American black would labor in the service of the GOP, or conservatives in general.  This includes fronting as a conservo columnist a la Tom Sowell,  regurgitating tropes and canards in line with standard conservative balderdash and ideology - when that same ideology has helped to keep the blacks in real and metaphorical chains for hundreds of years. Thus, the enigma of a "black Republican" or "black conservative" is often as head-scratching as seeing a pro-Nazi Jew, or a pro-Custer native American. It doesn't add up, and elicits much cognitive dissonance..

But why does it happen in the first place? Why do black men (and some black females)  make common cause with an organization, political party or ideology that through history has never had their best interests at heart?

Offhand, the history-savvy researcher can offer a couple of plausible reasons:

1) The black person lacks a deep knowledge of history, especially the specifics of how conservative thought has underscored slavery and exploitation of labor as well as engendered general racial discrimination (in terms of withholding services to blacks- including invention of the term "welfare queen" for poor female blacks on welfare), and voter suppression. (The GOP response to Obama getting re-elected by large numbers of sane African -Americans who realized they'd literally be "plowing the fields" under a Mitt Romney administration.)

This is actually the potential leading reason for a black to join up with any conservative group or cause: Ignorance. Plain, unadulterated, and unfiltered.  It also helps explain the choice. Clearly if the African American columnist or politician isn't aware of how his race has been exploited by radical Right adherents, he will not be motivated to avoid them, or castigate them.

This brings us to the next reason:

2) The black person is fully aware of the historical transgressions as well as exploitation of his race by Right extremists, but is prepared to either overlook them or forgive them.

This type of reaction would be expected from a highly religious black like Ben Carson- especially if a solid Christian conservative. While these types of sects favor moral absolutism they also place a high priority on forgiveness, as Yeshua would have done. Thus, the seed to forgive those who persecute would already be embedded in their consciousness and predispose them to absolve "Massah". Having done that it'd be just a small step to get aligned with the 'program'. I.e. to help Massah neutralize Demo blacks and render them either no impact (by vote suppression) or his mental slaves (by ingesting propaganda from conservo zombie blacks)

A side laugher: Wingnuts often portray progressives as "wanting to keep blacks on the Dem plantation" - but in fact, the converse is true. It is wingnuts who are deathly afraid of losing their small retinue of token blacks - like Herman Cain, Ben Carson, Tom Sowell et al. because these guys actually provide cover for their racism and Obama hate.  If there were no token blacks to hold up as "models" the full vile racism would be exposed - no "tokens" to help hide it.

Perhaps one of the most controversial reasons offered for political alignments of minorities with dominant white groups is that of "black appeasement of the white master" first put forward more than 35 years ago by Political Science Prof. Ralph Gonsalves - then at the University of the West Indies.

Gonsalves' theory likened the capitalist system (especially in the Caribbean) to a plantation, and just as slaves might compete for prominence in a sugar plantation so also many would do so in the capitalist plantation system. Those who got ahead, reaped the most benefits -- did so by ingratiating themselves with the power holders, CEOs and owners of capital. They often provided the PR to support the company or support the takeover aims, to increase profits.

In this regard, a columnist like Thomas Sowell would perfectly fit in with the profile of a propagandist for the white corporatists. His many columns reflect such support and at the same time show disdain for his struggling brothers. E.g.



Many right wingers often whine that the use of the term "Uncle Tom" (especially applied to one of their token blacks)  is a "racist" term which is really choice, given they like to depict Obama as a witch doctor.

In truth, the term "Uncle Tom" is quite legitimate, especially as applied to any African American who deliberately and knowingly undermines the advancement of his own race, as Thomas Sowell has consistently done via his endless columns on behalf of Wall Street oligarchs, rich White CEOs and the WHITE Neoliberal Overclass elites of this country.

When you churn out propaganda piece after propaganda piece, with no thought how it undermines your own race you are an Uncle Tom!

The sad fact here is the 'Uncle Tom" sobriquet fully applies because it is abundantly clear Sowell is "the Man's" house slave, doing his bidding to undermine his fellow blacks - with whom he no longer sees any affinity or common bond. I mean he's getting paid to write this drivel for "the Man" in the same way a house slave before the Civil War might have received perks (e.g. reading -writing privileges) for ratting on the field slaves!In that sense he's also little different from a past miscreant black repuke candidate named Herman Cain. But at least, in the latter case, that Uncle Tom's probability of becoming president  (like "Uncle Ben" Carson) is barely more than the probability of Martians landing at the Capitol  to abduct all the Repukes - sparing us their terrorist debt ceiling extortion and ongoing House Speaker drama!

During Hitler's Holocaust, Traitor Jews called "Sonderkommando" were used by the Nazis to sweet talk Jewish arrivals to the Concentration camps into disrobing for "showers" when they knew it was to allow more rapid passage into the gas chambers.

Today, we have an African -American contingent of 'Konservo-kommando'  who, while they don't expedite physical termination for their brothers, do work for their economic marginalization and "termination" (of voting franchise.).