1 RACE, RED COLOUR

Let’s talk about Race.

Let’s examine Ethnicity.  

      

What is ‘My people’ ‘Your people’?

One emotion is gradually becoming king today. HATE.

If Hate was a perfume, it would be the cheapest to get. It’s so much out there right now, you can bottle it up and have your own personal stash for years.

Why are people so filled with hatred, anger, malice, envy, jealousy and many other negative emotions these days? Have Positive Emotions taken a holiday? What’s going on? Where is the Love?

Today, you find most people more than ready to ‘bring down’ rather than ‘pull up’.

I want to narrow it down by focusing on Race. In Nigeria, we’re predominantly a country filled with black people, so for this write-up,  I will keep an extra-focus on Ethnicity. Here lies our problem.

Yoruba people are like blah blah blah

Igbo people always blah blah blah

Hausa people can never blah blah blah

And hosts of other trait people authoritatively associate with many ethnic groups.

When will we stop seeing one person as the yard-stick for a whole ethnic group, and start seeing people as human beings first?

I am privileged to have been raised in a home where ethnicity wasn’t an issue. Don’t get me wrong, there are characteristics and cultural values that are uniquely symbolic to each ethnic group and from time to time, in my home, you could hear things like, “Don’t you know if you’re going to an Igbo person’s wedding, you have to blah blah blah” or “When you sit to eat with an Hausa elder, you don’t blah blah blah”. Yes, there were times when we’d yap other ethnic groups, but we always kept it fair, it was never in an attitude of “We’re better than them” or “We’re the superior ethnic group”.

This made it easy for me to relate and easily make friends with people of diverse ethnic origins. I never saw them as ‘This one from that place’, they were just friends –loved and appreciated. Truth be told, some of my closest friends till date (people who I absolutely adore), are not even from my ethnic group and we’ve kept our friendship tight and strong for years. This isn’t an accomplishment for me, it’s not like I deliberately set out to ‘do One Nigeria’, so I can beat my chest about it. It’s simply this- I met great people, we clicked, we became friends and have stayed close. I thank God for this, I really do. ‘Cause I’ve learnt a lot from them over the years and I want to believe they’ve learnt from me too.

My Darlings, If any of you was brought up to look down on another race, mis-trust another ethnic group, hate a particular set of people because of the colour of  their skin or the place they’re from, then you need to GET RID OF THAT MINDSET NOW! It’s not healthy. It’s like using one colour to paint a whole house.

For instance, you love white, you know white, white is good. 

So you buy buckets and drums of white paint and paint the entire house with it; The Gate, The Fence, The Railings, The building’s wall, Bedrooms, Kitchen, Toilets, Living room, Pantry, Garage, Study, Windows, every single corner! Imagine how weird, ugly (and even suspicious) that would look?

I mean, even the White House diversified its colours. Not everywhere (in and out) is painted white.

Put yourself in other people’s shoes; When you were young, the people around you told you one ethnic group is so horrible, wicked, you can never trust them, they betray, they kill, they are dirty, they are diabolic, they are ugly etc and you grew up entrenched in this mindset about the people. So now  you’re grown and matured enough to explore the world for yourself, but you refuse, stubbornly stick  to your notions,  and on your first contact with someone from that ethnic division, you act out horribly. You should ask yourself; Is your behaviour justified? Did that person do something to warrant that attitude from you? If you were in the person’s shoes, how would you feel?

Or you’re the free-minded type, bravo! You were brought up to believe something about a particular set of people, but you didn’t hold it to heart. So one day, you meet someone from that place and the person behaves in exactly the way you were taught to believe. From then on, you say to yourself “Yes, everyone was right. These people are like this. I will never trust any one of them again”. You see what you did there? Now, the lesson for you isn’t about being careful in future dealings or learning to look before you leap. No, it’s now about “The people from this place always behave like this. You can’t trust them” And so you pass this mind set and ideology on to the next person and the next, until a whole generation buys into it.

You’ve become part of the problem but you justify it by quelling your conscience and saying “What? I gave them a chance and they failed me” 

 

Errr Bros/Sis, who died and made you Emperor of The World? 'They' failed you? REALLY?

Please wake up Dears! Before we send ourselves back to the dark ages where kingdoms go to war just because someone from one kingdom, dared to look at a maiden from another kingdom.

It’s time to open our eyes to the beauty of the world around us. It’s time to be humans beings first and every other thing next. Judge people for people, not for the colour of their skin, their background, ethnic group or religion.  Spread love and cheer, not judgment and hate.

Don’t get so hung up on your bigotry, ethnic intolerance, xenophobia and racism that you lose out on meeting some of the most amazing people in the world, people who perhaps God has sent to your life to fill it up with laughter and goodness. 

This is what I believe and if you don't, I want you to try believing it also;

There is only one race; THE HUMAN RACE.

There is only one colour; RED, THE COLOUR OF BLOOD.

KEEP MOVING FORWARD!