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Eid Al-Adha: June 28 or June 29. EID MUBARAK
Eid Al-Adha is a commemoration of the devotion of Prophet Abraham and the survival of his son Ishmael. Eid is for the celebration, joy, and giving of one’s wealth. Eid honors this event by the sacrificing of a sheep, ram, goat, cow or camel and the meat is divided equally among the poor, families, and friends.
In Kuwait Eid will be on June 28th for 6 days’ holidays, and Guyana is expected to celebrate on June 29th. During Eid Al-Adha, there will be Prayer, Takbeers (Chants, Allah O Akbar), Sacrifice, Sharing and Best Clothes.
GUYANA, Race and Caste
The apparent inability, will or desire by the leaders to rise to the challenges for IMPROVED RACE RELATIONS in Guyana, will continue to be a source of HOLDING BACK of GUYANA’S TRANSFORMATION, as the Guyanese Nation, CARICOM, and Globally are aware. IF NO IMPROVEMENT, genuine strategic development will be A WISH, HOPE, and DREAM. YES, almost daily there will be LOAN SHARKS with HIGH INTEREST RATES and maybe “ kickbacks” for families, friends and favorites, for projects with NO Publicly available Feasibilities Studies, on the projects’ viabilities.
QUOTE: “ Recall, after Sir Winston Churchill’s Iron Curtain speech at Fulton in the presence of US President Harry S. Truman that the Cold War was red hot in the late 50s and 60s and members of the Government of India were willing to support this suggestion by elements within the PPP to bring Indians from Kerala because it was regarded as a Communist enclave. Not New Delhi nor Bombay to Guyana because they were happy to get rid of these communist in India. This was, therefore, more an ideological issue than one of race or caste, but because of an already racially polarized society in Guyana, we viewed this as an effort to increase the Indian population and therefore Indian vote. The artful contention of a denial of the above by some officials in and from Trinidad is again an absurdity.” Hamilton Green, OR, CCH, 4th. Prime Minister; Guyanese First Deputy Prime Minister, Vice President, and Lord Mayor City of Georgetown.
CASTE the Best Seller Book and soon, the Netflix, MOVIE
“ Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents” is a nonfiction book by Isabel Wilkerson that describes racism in the United States as an aspect of a caste system. The book compares aspects of the experience of American people of color to the caste systems of India and Nazi Germany.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • “An instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far.”—Dwight Garner, The New York Times
In October 2020, Netflix announced that it would produce a film adaptation of the book to be titled Caste and directed by Ava DuVernay.
5 Notable Endorsements of the CASTE book are as follows:
President Bill Clinton, “ It literally changed the way I thought about the world and deepened my understanding of it more than any book. I’ve read a long time. It is worthy of a lifetime of study. It is a magnificent gift to our country and to the people of the world.”
President Barack Hussein Obama, “ Powerful and timely…I cannot recommend it strongly enough.”
Tracy Kidder, Pulitzer Prize winning Author of “Mountains Beyond Mountains”, “It is bracing to be reminded with such precision that our country was built through genocide and slavery. But Ms. Wilkerson has also provided a renewed way of understanding America’s longest, fiercest trouble in all its complexity. Her book leaves me grateful and hopeful. I gulped it down.”
Rajmohan Gandhi, India Today, “CASTE mingles comparison, history, sociology, and a string of shattering stories…More than appropriately, Wilkerson likens the situation of INDIA’S DALITS to that of AMERICAN BLACKS…India needs mind-shaking books like CASTE that unveil for India’s top layers (including for the willfully blind) the realities being endured in the thick bottom.”
Sudipta Datta, The Hindu, India, “Some may argue that linking race relations in America to Nazi atrocities and the Indian caste system is tenuous, but (Wilkerson) strongly argues her case with a powerful document that holds lessons for aggressors and their victims all over the world… A painful exploration of what human beings capable of doing to each other.”
When in Guyana, will ALL the responsible persons in authority, elected and unelected, stand up for the daily PPP’s injustices to the first peoples, especially their children; the poor, sick, helpless, differently abled and of different orientation.??? DO HOPE IT IS SOON, as the time is NOW, with the Blessed OIL Wealth for its LEGAL OWNERS, the 6 Races.
EDUCATION must be BOTTOM UP in place of the current TOP-DOWN methods, with a REWRITING of TEXTBOOKS to cover comprehensively RACE, CASTE and CAST OUT, in the British Guiana and Guyana’s history, experiences and cultures, and to include the strategic and compulsory languages training in Spanish and Portuguese.
In Guyana and the Diaspora there are the skills, will and expertise, with LIVED EXPERIENCES, to undertake this NON PARTISAN COMMISSION Project. Start was made at AFC on the Move Saturday’s TV Programs with Videos and Globespan weekly programs with Videos, which can ALL be the start. With respect, my suggestion is for this COMMISSION of SEVEN Persons, with TWO CO-CHAIRS, Professor Dr. Kimani S. K. Nehusi and Attorney Ravi Dev, Esq, and five members 1 each from PPP, APNU, AFC, Civil Society, and Past Justice of the Courts.
8 Pillars of caste by Isabel Wilkerson, Book “Caste.”
In Caste, Wilkerson identifies eight “pillars of caste“, or features of caste systems in various societies:
- Divine will: the belief that social stratification is beyond human control, either divinely ordained or a natural law, as in the biblical story of the curse of Ham that was used to justify Black inferiority in the U.S.
- Heritability: the belief that social status is acquired at birth and immutable, as codified e.g. in the U.S. “one-drop rule” that determined Black ancestry
- Endogamy: the prohibition of sex and marriage between castes, as in the former U.S. anti-miscegenation laws
- Purity and pollution: the belief that the dominant caste is “pure” and must be protected against pollution by the inferior castes, as shown in the segregation of facilities for bathing, eating, education, etc. in the U.S. Jim Crow era
- Occupational hierarchy: the reservation of the more desirable occupations for the superior castes, as enshrined in U.S. Jim Crow laws that restricted Black people to farm or domestic work
- Dehumanisation and stigma: the denial of individuality and human dignity of lower-caste individuals, as through the various arbitrary punishments and restrictions to which enslaved and free Black people were subject to in the U.S., down to racist carnival games.
- Terror and cruelty: as means of enforcement of the caste system and control of lower-caste people, as through the whippings of slaves or the lynchings of Black people in the U.S.
- Inherent superiority and inferiority: of castes: the belief that people of one caste are inherently superior to those of other castes, expressed e.g. in restrictions on clothing or displays of status by lower-caste people (such as driving a car).
Wilkerson illustrates these pillars through examples from three caste systems: those of India, Nazi Germany, and the United States.
The caste system derives from a Portuguese labeling system.
There was a history of religious conflict in Portugal that led to the development of a kind of classification system. When Portuguese colonists came to India, they applied similar practices to the native people.
The Argument
In the 1300s, the Christian Portuguese were persecuting the Jewish people. Under pressure from the empire, many Jews converted to Christianity. However, when those converts rose to prominent positions in the Church, they drew the resentment of “original” Christian clergy. Furthermore, those converts’ subsequent affiliation with tax collectors made them unpopular with poor Christians. Thus, persecution continued against Jewish-descended Christians. Christian leaders began to declare that only “original” Christians were worthy of acknowledgement. The idea of a “casta,” a classification based on descent, was formed. And members of the Jewish “casta” were barred from opportunity. When Portuguese colonists came to India, they applied the same classification system to the native people. They believed that different groups stayed separate to preserve a purity of bloodline, just as they did in Portugal. This idea propagated in India and became integral to its history. Not only the title, but also the very nature of the caste system, was given by the influence of the Portuguese.
Counter arguments
The Portuguese influence on the caste system was nothing more than putting a name to a pre-existing practice of separation they observed on arrival, as Guha’s article implies. They didn’t invent the practice; they simply gave it the name we know it by today. But the practice itself has deep historical roots – far earlier.
The caste system derives from a Portuguese labeling system. – Encyclopedia of Opinion (parlia.com)
BLACK HISTORY in INDIA
Africans in India: From slaves to reformers and rulers
“ India and Africa have a shared history in trade, music, religion, arts, and architecture, but the historical link between these two diverse regions is rarely discussed.
Many Africans travelled to India as slaves and traders, but eventually settled down here to play an important role in India’s history of kingdoms, conquests, and wars. Some of them, like Malik Ambar in Ahmadnagar (in western India), went on to become important rulers and military strategists. Ambar was known for taking on the powerful Mughal rulers of northern India”
Africans in India: From slaves to reformers and rulers – BBC News
“ Black history in India begins around the 14th and 15th centuries. We chose this date because it is Republic Day in India from 1950. Many people throughout this country celebrate and affirm when India’s constitution came into force, completing the country’s transition toward becoming an independent republic.”
“The Registry chose India’s Republic Day to celebrate the history of Habshis and Siddis, Africans and African descendants in South Asia and India since 1400. In the 15th century, Black East Africans came to India through the slave trade. There is, however, no evidence of great numbers of African slaves in India. Africans also visited India as free people, merchants, and ambassadors from East African states.”
Black History in India, a story – African American Registry (aaregistry.org)