Eight of the 10 blacks who actually celebrate Kwanzaa.
1,401 words
Public officials still pretend Kwanzaa is a real holiday. It’s taught to schoolchildren as one of the holidays of the “holiday” season, even though nobody knows anyone who actually celebrates it. It’s a day we’re all forced to pretend that being black is a religion, just like Christianity and Judaism.
Prominent personalities love to tweet out their appreciation for the fake holiday. Some of the worst examples this year came from Vice President Kamala Harris, the College Republicans’ official feed, and NASCAR.
Harris insisted that her family celebrated Kwanzaa while she was growing up and that her “elders” shared their Kwanzaa stories over the holiday meal:
My favorite principle is the second: Kujichagulia (self-determination). This principle is about having the power to design your own life and determine your own future. It’s a deeply American principle. From our family to yours, happy Kwanzaa.
— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) December 27, 2021
The idea of Harris’ elders sharing stories of black empowerment at the Kwanzaa dinner is a bit strange. For one, Harris wasn’t raised by a black family, she was raised as a teenager by her Indian family in Canada. Her black father is Jamaican and he isn’t fond of his daughter pretending to be a typical African-American. Since both sides were immigrants, there were no elders to share their Kwanzaa experiences — and Kwanzaa was certainly not a real thing to any person not involved in Black Nationalism in the 1960s and ‘70s. It was only created by a radical of dubious ethics, Maulana Karenga, in 1966, so it’s highly unlikely that any Indian or Jamaican grandpa had much interest in it at the time. But we’re all supposed to believe this lie and pretend that an Indian family in Canada celebrated a Black Nationalist holiday in the 1970s. It’s not like anyone is gonna fact check this, anyway.
Harris can’t help but lie in all her public statements. This time, it’s one where she plays a role that’s definitely not suited for her. She is essentially an Indian woman who passed as black and managed to rise to the highest echelons of power thanks to her being the lone black woman the Democrats could trust with power. If she were authentic, she would talk more about her Indian heritage and stop pretending to enjoy Tupac. But Indians are not yet as big of a power bloc as blacks are in America, so she tries her best to pretend she’s black, and that involves her making up Kwanzaa stories from her childhood.
It still makes more sense for Kamala to pretend she cares about Kwanzaa than it does for the College Republicans and NASCAR to do the same. Both entities cater to overwhelmingly white audiences. Even the few blacks who may be involved in them are unlikely to celebrate the Black Nationalist holiday. Yet, both groups tweeted about Kwanzaa like it was another Christmas.
The College Republicans, which organizes tens of thousands of young conservatives on university campuses, tweeted this:
Wishing you a happy and prosperous Kwanza! pic.twitter.com/PaANsF7Itg
— College Republicans (@CRNC) December 26, 2021
The GOP usually gets less than 10% of the black vote in elections. (The College Republicans also forgot an A in “Kwanzaa.”) The post was rightfully mocked by most conservatives. One of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s last posts during her final week on Twitter eviscerated it, calling Kwanzaa a fake holiday made up by a lunatic. (Fact check: true. Kwanzaa was invented by a deranged Black Nationalist who was jailed for a slew of crimes in the 1970s.)
NASCAR’s tweet was even worse than the College Republicans’:
On the final day of Kwanzaa, we recognize the importance of its principles & symbolism of the black, red & green candles signifying the people, struggle & hope for the future.
We apologize for not accurately depicting this in a prior post & send warm wishes to all who celebrate. pic.twitter.com/Ect8gsFDGv
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) January 1, 2022
You can buy Greg Johnson’s It’s Okay to Be White here.
It pretends that its overwhelmingly white and conservative audience is observing the seven days of Kwanzaa and apologizes for getting some random factoid wrong that no one even paid any attention to. Who does NASCAR’s tweet even appeal to? There are hardly any blacks who watch stock car racing in the first place.
What all these tweets say is that America’s primary institutions are just going through the motions. If they’re told they have to pretend to celebrate a Black Nationalist meme holiday, they celebrate it. It’s just what modern-day branding requires. Nobody bothers to investigate whether this message is needed or not.
It’s likely that only a half-million Americans celebrate Kwanzaa, out of an estimated 42 million blacks in the US. Its style and “traditions” are out of step with modern black identity. It rips off Hanukkah to promote Black Nationalist principles that blacks don’t care about, and celebrates self-determination when blacks just want handouts and a superior moral status to whites. Kwanzaa adorns itself with Pan-African colors and themes, while blacks have largely moved beyond the symbolism of the old-style Black Nationalism. A simple Black Lives Matter flag now suffices.
Juneteenth will likely supplant Kwanzaa as the black holiday par excellence in this country, as it better conveys American blacks’ current priorities: encouraging white guilt and racial resentment instead of racial independence. The single principle of grievance is easier to understand than Kwanzaa’s seven mumbo-jumbo principles.
Kwanzaa is undoubtedly a funny holiday, however. Imagine the most autistic White Nationalist building a whites-only holiday around Yule that incorporated the cringiest aspects of the movement, and then the government declared it a real holiday. That’s Kwanzaa.
Just look at the seven principles:
Umoja
Umoja means unity in Swahili. Karenga defines this on his Kwanzaa website as: “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.”
Kujichagulia
Or self-determination. This principle refers to defining, naming, creating, and speaking for oneself.
Ujima
Translated as “collective work and responsibility,” ujima refers to uplifting your community.” To build and maintain our community together and make our brother’s and sister’s problems our problems and to solve them together,” Karenga writes.
Ujamaa
Cooperative economics. Similar to ujima, this principle refers to uplifting your community economically. “To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together,” he writes.
Nia
Nia means purpose. Karenga expands on this principle by writing, “To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.”
Kuumba
Meaning “creativity,” Karenga defines this principle as “To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.”
Imani
The final principle translates to “faith.” Karenga defines this as faith in community, writing, “To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.
Not a single black person is actually familiar with these concepts. Just imagine if all white Americans were thought to celebrate a holiday whose principles came from Old Norse, but not a single white person knew them.
They would, of course, not allow us to have our own Kwanzaa in any case. Some on our side have thought that this is a good idea, but if it ever actually became a thing for us, it would just further marginalize us in the eyes of ordinary whites. It would never be taught in schools, and it would just make us look stranger and further apart from the rest of white America.
Black Nationalists can be as ridiculous as they want to because there is no social stigma attached to their ideology, and many blacks don’t mind its goofier aspects. Plus, every institution is compelled to celebrate it. Just look at NASCAR’s tweet.
All this will look harmless when compared to the messages we’ll receive for Juneteenth, however, a less comical holiday that resonates to a greater degree with the current moment. You’ll see major corporations celebrating blacks as the true founding fathers and committing themselves to deconstructing whiteness. They will go far beyond lighting up the Africana menorah and dedicate themselves to the ideology of anti-whiteness.
Kwanzaa celebrations are merely absurd. Juneteenth is far more nefarious, and the messages delivered to us by politicians and the sports leagues for Kwanzaa is just a preview of what we’ll see on June 19, 2022.
10 comments
Any future dates where hanukkah and kwanzaa-rama intersect the black-jewish entertainment alliance should celebrate Hanukwanzaah as a symbol of unity and friendship between Boca Raton and Detroit against the perils of amerikan whites who treat both safeguarded groups far better than their own do. ujamaa, the fourth of nguzo saba was grossly violated from Watts to rodney king to george floyd but I supposed that’s our fault as well to huckster robin diangelo and the dolts who pay for her twaddle. Same with the kuttiya harris and warren the buffalo calf road woman’s brazen phoniness; both liars dwarf that snake john kerry’s bungle when campaigning in 2004 he told a crowd of Michiganders he goes for Buckeye football. None of these people give a shadow of a fuck. At All. The gop’s campus fledglings could have posted kwanz-uh! and a cross-eyed emoji to mock this dumb faux-holiday but as dennis miller’s career shows, funny is foreign to them like preserving a racially homogenous and functional united states against subversion. Battle rap leagues are more sacred to the 13/50 crowd than principle-names no one has ever heard of, and all could be mistaken for wide receivers. Let’s belatedly celebrate with a glass of umqombothi slopped out of a shit barrel. Cheers!
I like the idea of a white nationalist holiday. Something created by an articulate and philosophical non felon which would be in agreement with or fit into any other credo, ie would not offend Christianity or other. Some of the principles in Kwanzaa are nice, if rudimentary. Focus on positive, identitarian principles that would be difficult to pervert as violent or supremacist. We could light tiki torches instead of candles, lol.
I mean something all white identitarians could agree on, with no political fault lines. A week in which wignats and mods could embrace as brethren.
There’s already a few. Columbus Day causes massive triggering every year it rolls around. Then there are Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthdays, which used to be federal holidays when I was a kid. They had to get mashed up as Presidents’ Day to make way for St. Dr. Rev. MLK Jr. Day.
Indeed, some of the seven principles are positive and could lead adherents to a brighter future. If only we could convince the kangz and kweenz of Wakanda to adhere to them.
There might be potential to hijack and subvert this fake holiday into something more beneficial to the White race.
Good article and keep up the good work!
This is the first year I’ve ever heard of the “7 principles” of this faux holiday. It seems like they’re just making it all up as they go along. Makes you wonder what other silly “practices and traditions” will come to light on June 19th this year.
Snorted out loud at ujamaa. Really? Do ujamaa gun into the temple of a black liquor store owner while robbing in your own ‘hood to show support and solidarity?
Did we witness ujamaa in action last summer when they burned down their own communities over the death of a felon high on fentanyl? Principles… don’t make me laugh!
I’d be down for celebrating more WN holidays, even if some were created. This last December, I spent some time reading up on and watching videos about Yule (Jul). WN should start saying, “Happy Yuletide” and embrace it as our own holiday. No need to get kooky or autistic with it, we just need to formally own it. Christmas has become commercialized and has a multicultural/diversity feel to it. It just feels like a cheap, materialistic rip off of Yule.
Do the real Africans in real Africa celebrate that Kwanzaa? Because I asked a couple of African students here, and they don’t know anything about such a holiday.
I do not celebrate a New Year´s Day on the 1st of January, but on the 21st and 22nd of March, but anyway it would never have occurred to me to impose this day as a holiday on all other people.
I grew up and played sports with a lot of black people and not one of them celebrated Kwanzaa.
If you have a Subscriber access,
simply login first to see your comment auto-approved.
Note on comments privacy & moderation
Your email is never published nor shared.
Comments are moderated. If you don't see your comment, please be patient. If approved, it will appear here soon. Do not post your comment a second time.