So my latest development is almost ready, and thus I will soon be back to my regular schedule of posts. I think everyone will enjoy my latest project, and I am eagerly looking forward to comments on it.
But in the meantime I have noticed that Black History Month has been rather quiet on the news about African Americans. For the entire year this tends to be the time where the most positive news reports and historical facts are presented to the public. Yet, this month seemed to be void of virtually any news.
Perhaps the fact that Mr. James Brown has not been buried for 2 months was not the most positive story, but I think it is news worthy. [If the 2 weeks that Ms. Anna Nicole Smith has not been buried is any example] But there has been little else in the news, not even the usual fluff news items. If the general media can’t find anything positive to say, what will the rest of the year look like, I wonder. Perhaps I have been working to hard though and missed some items. Am I wrong? Have you seem any positive, and hopefully substantive, news out there?
But I did notice somethings that caught my attention. While neither is directly about Black Americans, they do deal with our history and roots. The first deals directly with our past. Though it is well understood that the whole of mathematics as it exists today is a direct result of the introduction of the number 0 by Egyptians to the less civilized peoples in the north Mediterranean (as I recall, correct me if I am wrong). It has been reported that it was this advanced understanding of mathematics that helped create the Pyramids. But Western Society takes many of the claims for further advances in the sciences and mathematics after that time.
Of course this is wrong. And now there is so further vindication. Besides the fact that some of the medical advances that helped reign in the Plague came from the Middle East, there is now evidence that some of designs in Mosques dating back as far as the 1100’s reveal advanced mathematics that were so advanced they weren’t recognized until the 1970’s and only now being fully understood. Only now is it seen how the designs made while Europe was in the Dark Ages, were growing in complexity and reflected advanced knowledge. Nice to see some respect, even if it took a millennium to get it.
On a somber and sobering note is a book that I think may be worth reading. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier seems to be a reminder, to me at least, that for all the problems in America life is not that bad. This is a true story of the life of a man, that as a child lived and fought in a civil war in Sierra Leone. This is the worst kind of life any child could live through. The fact that the civil strife in Africa is often overlooked by American media makes this even more important.
But there is also the fact that Mr. Ishmael Beah has been able to overcome these horrors, to some degree, and has graduated Oberlin College and written this book is a testament to America. I must note that even rap music has had the unforeseen benefit of saving lives of children during the brutal violence, which amazes me.
Starbuck is promoting this book, and more should be said of this story. Not only during Black History Month, but throughout the year. I find it inspirational that Mr. Beah has overcome so much. I find it a wake-up call that he could come to America and achieve so much after living through horrors that do not afflict African Americans. I also find it sad that this had to happen to any child, and that so little about this strife was ever mentioned here.
Drugs, racism, poverty (as Americans consider it), and other ills do exist but they can all be overcome. Life could be so much worse. We could do more. I feel this book could help many understand that. As I said, it’s on my list of books I want to read.
This is what I think, what do you think?
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