Black History Month
By Juan Moreno Haines
I, on the brink of 30 years of incarceration, am relying on my 67 years of lived experience to reflect on Black History Month. In addition, I asked poet and spoken word artist, Jason “Knowledge Supreme Mind” Jackson to join me by writing and recording something evocative. He wrote and performed “Fallacies Slain.” (See below.)
I am one of the nearly two million people living in an American prison, jail, or detention center—places that science shows do more harm than good to the person under lock and key. They are just as harmful to prison officials who oversee their cruel mandate, aimed at creating unseen, unheard, and unfelt people by etching out existences. The Prison Industrial Complex processes people into commodities, neatly wrapped in a cloak of false promises, peddling “Public Safety.” In the PIC’s cages and dungeons are a disproportionate number of Black people.
Fallacies Slain says that the public receives “the sanitized version of our identities,” which is how I feel when I see much of the one-sided and overly negative media coverage of incarcerated people. My incarceration experience lets me see, first-hand, ineffectual social policies that dehumanize mainly people of color, cascading them into mass incarceration.
- In the 21st century, the United States continues to practice legalized slavery, which is the PIC’s economic security.
- A large number of Americans with mental illness and substance use disorders live in state prisons and county jails.
- America’s public schools are underfunded and operate with poorly paid teachers, and many across the nation are shutting down.
- One serious medical issue bankrupts a middle-class family.
- A large percentage of workers do not earn a livable wage.
- A discriminatory criminal legal system adds to dysfunctional social policies.
Consider that among American citizens serving time, only those held in Vermont, Maine, and Washington, D.C., are able to exercise the right to vote. Yet, they represent a mere few thousand within the nearly two million people in America’s prisons and jails.
“Fallacies Slain” looks at American principles and then speaks to the hypocritical laws passed to snuff out those beliefs.
As an incarcerated journalist, I too have recognized societal hypocrisies that create fallacies and make communities dysfunctional.
Reporting on successful and positive incarcerated people does not sell newspapers or play well to the analytics of social media. Negativity, however, driven by mainstream media, turns into billions of influencer dollars. Yet, inside San Quentin Rehabilitation Center, people are engaged in restorative justice, religious services, vocational training, and higher education. Folks are returning to their families in better shape than when they entered the PIC.
To celebrate their history, one must acknowledge the truth. Getting to the truth in a democracy, however, is challenging when only a few wealthy men tell the story. It’s when every person in a nation tells their truth that future generations can build on a foundation of fidelity.
Black history is American history, contends Jackson. As Americans, we must collectively identify deceptive fallacies and stereotypes that distract us from our inalienable rights that no King could ever take away—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Black history has always been American history.
Fallacies Slain
By Knowledge Supreme Mind Jackson
It was never about a week
A week turned into a month
That slowly became commoditized like rush hour lunch
How much does a mistranslated history cost
When sold on the auction block by authors who write with
Plagiarized pens
The hypocrisy of recognition means they acknowledge
Only that which leaves feathers unruffled
Are we to praise the sanitized versions of our identities
While they make a mockery of our past
“Genuine” coming in the form of twisted smiles
And enough sugar poured on lies to trick the palates
Of ignorant tongues
Eurocentric fears are echoed in their desperate measures
To mislabel our truths as weapons
Then ban them from their classrooms before their children
Are awakened from their unconscious states
Where fallacies are slain
And insecurities reveal more secrets than they keep
Reveal more secrets than a month could hold
Fallacies slain in bold
And long before the pyramids were
We were
Nabta Playa
Ancient Nubia
It was Abyssinia before Ethiopia
Building exploring creating
We were
Before boats trafficked Black bodies like drugs
We were here
Everywhere
We had been
Crossing seas like the wind
Ignited the fires that lit the candles of civilized nations
We must honor the truth if we’re celebrating
Bless the soul of Carter Woodson for laying the foundations
Black History month is World History always
How do we trap the reasons behind existence’s existence within 28 days
Fallacies slain
Black History month is World History always
Our endless contributions flowing through the veins of every country
Lifeblood of the soil
People of the earth cradled mankind like the sun
Memories inextinguishable
These hands fathered “toil”
So that everywhere you look thrive the products of our intellect
Tell the truth
Fallacies slain
They must say “thank you” in advance of our arrival
Fallacies slain
Harriet, Hampton, Huey, Elijah, King, Malcolm, Stokely, Baldwin, Douglass, Imhotep, every breath, Woodson, Jackson, Mumia, Sojourner, Miles, Coltrane, Gil Scott, Baraka, for every breath, Banneker, Morrison, Butler, Giovanni, Jazz, Hip Hop, Soul, Blues, Country, Big Mama Thornton, the cell phone, light bulb, street lights, stop sign, potato chip, ice cream, iron, elevator, locomotive engine, gas mask, bicycle, alarm system, Washington D.C.
For everything
For the past
For the future
For today
Fallacies slain
Black History Month is World History always
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