What do you know about Bermuda’s History? Is a question Bermudians ask when I make political commentary? For if I did know anything about Bermuda’s history; I would not have painted The PLP as white peoples or say those things about Dr. Brown. Further, Itis clear that you don’t know your culture. Don’t like yourself. And, you suffer from internalized racism; You’re a mouthpiece for white people; you pay too much attention to white history and not your black history and this, coming from my wife.
It seems that my art is not enough to express how I feel. Art needs interpretation, and that is limited and subjective as the observer’s art education. And let’s face it; we don’t get an art education, like everything else we get propagandized; we are told by experts what is right or bad. As Fritz Pearls said, we are in contact with the art critic’s opinion, or your art teacher’s. “Our dependency makes slaves out of us, especially if this dependency is a dependency of our self-esteem.” And as the psychologist say if our self-esteem is based on a “black” identity, we are slaves to it. So if you want to fit-in with black folks or white folks, you have to tow some ideological, moral, line.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations,
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you, and I am I, and if by chance we find each other, it’s beautiful.
If not, it can’t be helped.”Fritz Pearls
Winston Churchill famously said, “History is written by the victors.” Better Yet, history is written by the brainwashers. So it’s up to you to seek the truth whatever that is because the truth of history is the ideology you choose.
And in Bermuda what you choose depends on skin color social opinions of biological differences between peoples. An ideology that’s associated with thinkers like Dr. Eva Hodgson and understood by most Bermudians…”I grew up in a segregated society,” she said. “In fact I’ve spent as much time in a segregated society as a non-segregated society. “Some people may say I have only one string in my bow, or that I dwell in the past. But the fact is that segregation was such a large part of my formative years, and it impacted me in so many ways – from my psyche to my economic circumstances. It was true for me as it was for many other black people. Even today I recognize in myself some [traits] I had to adopt during government-sponsored segregation.” Dr. Eva Hodgson OBE
We will get to that ideology later. Let me tell what I know about Bermuda’s History. The group that inadvertently Settled Bermuda, in 1609 by the Virginia Company when the Sea Venture, wrecked on the reefs. Stayed, to maintain a claim for England, they did not encounter opposition; like well-armed natives or armed Spanish conquistadors.
From It’s Beginning Bermuda was not comparatively difficult. A group of nobles subdivided it into parishes named for the shareholders, in the Company. These aristocrats hope to make a returned on investment. In those days, everyone was property of some kingdom, not just In Europe, the whole world Practice some form of feudalism, as the PLP puts it, right up to 1963, declaring of Bermuda: “It was a veritable feudal system, with only land-owners having the right to vote.”
The Company even found hogs and plenty of fishing. With a steady stream of indentured servants, everybody got along well. Early on Bermuda thrived, though it was never profitable for its investors; who planted tobacco, the cash crop of the time. Bermuda could not compete financially with the large plantations in the Americas. The plantations in the Americas produce larger and better crop making Bermuda’s cash crop less profitable.
Islanders turned to shipbuilding and maritime trades, but “The Company,” which gained its profits only from the land cultivation, forbade the construction of any vessels without its license. Its interference in Bermudians livelihood would lead to its dissolution. Interference will be a recurring practice in Bermuda. The Shipbuilders went above “The Company’s” with a better offer to the Crown: they could pay more taxes with their shipbuilding and maritime trade profits.
The Virginia Company dissolved in 1622, with the administration of its continental colony passing to the Crown; in 1620, a colonial parliament was created, the House of Assembly. Suffrage was restricted to male landowners, all probably white Euro-Bermudians.
17th century Bermuda saw the influx of free black Spanish speaking west indies Into “The company’s” pool of bargain European indentured servants; sharing same rights: after a certain time you are set free. However, Bermuda was too small for such competition. So the Euro-Bermudians manage to get the terms of indenture black West Indian raised from seven years to ninety-nine. The new Blacks have no political power. They could not complain to Spain, they’ve just escaped from Spanish territories; they must have heard of the opportunities in Bermuda where you’re only indentured for seven years. Like today’s guest workers; they had no rights. Now Bermudians like tell them, “You can go home.”
The Euro-Bermudians found a way to create interference with the new Spanish-speaking black residents. These new indentured servants were classified as different kind of human. A different race altogether, and, a morality had to justify these actions, the church: the church has morality over the Crown, and Crown is the church. The subjects had to believe in the authority of the church; morality only works if you believed. Slavery is brutal for sure; you can spend all your time plotting to kill your “master”. Nonetheless, if you believe murder is morally wrong, it was best to remain a slave. And be a faithful slave: “Thy bond-men and thy bond-maids which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen that are round about you: of them shall ye buy bond-men and bond-maids. Moreover, of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land. And they shall be your possession. And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them for a possession, they shall be your bond-man forever.”
—Leviticus 25:44-46 Forever? — FOREVER!
Some Bermudians will tell you that Bermuda was run by an oligarchy of white Segregationist supremacist hell-bent on the oppression of black peoples. The reality is that these Europeans were hell-bent on making a profit. Just like their counterparts in the Americas. It cost plenty of money to transport a slave from Africa, keep them from killing you – for segregation; why not just leave the African in Africa. Bermuda did not have this problem, the majority of the blacks came to Bermuda with marketable skills and they too manage to prosper. And under segregation many strived serving the needs of a black community. I was told by and elderly Court St. Merchant, “everything you wanted could be found on Court St.”: Bank; movies; shops, “everything,” he said.
When PLP form the first political party; prior to them entering the seen, Bermuda was under Independent Parliamentary rule at the time, “No unified voting block”. The PLP made immediate impact. To the white establishment, the Parliament, it most of look like socialism was coming in with its high taxes and less profit, or the niggers are taking over.
Bermuda was and is now a British Overseas Territory under a monarch with a governor, just like the old days of the Company and shipbuilder. The Shipbuilder demands for their right to make a living got rid of “The Company,” with their insistence on non-profitable land cultivation; it was theirs, and they had control. Appeals from a majority to the “Crown” today will do the same. So it’s a matter of perspective how you choose to see the political history of Bermuda, for it has not change much. Say, for the one-man vote.
The PLP Platform called for electoral reforms; in 1960 the Committee for Universal Adult Suffrage was active throughout the Island campaigning for the abolition of the property vote and installation of universal adult suffrage for all Bermudians twenty-one years of age and over. It says in the history of the UBP.
The prime movers of this group were Dr. Stanley Ratteray, Mr. Arnold Francis, Mr. Walter Robinson, Mr. Edward Dejean, Mr. Roosevelt Brown, and John W. Swan.
Land owning Bermudians could vote several times: they were the economy like; the 17th century “Company” they generated the wealth; and made laws to keep their advantage. Which was to eliminate competition and they use the authority of the government to do so and here we come to a fundamental difference labor definitely disagreed; after all there was more of them. Shipbuilders did not like the restriction and penalties neither did the workers of 1960;s they wanted rights, not more rights but rights, rights to their earnings. They paid taxes but got less service and status for it: movie thicket interfered; the churches interfered; the justice system interfered; Banking interfered; the school system and the employment sector interfered; health care interfered.
And that is the principal behind the founders of Bermuda first political party. We want equal rights. They paid taxes. Its like today’s PRC’s taxpayers thinking they have a right to parliamentary representation because they work and contributes to the economy. That will undermined the political power of the PLP. How? They will have to cater to those voters, to get and maintain power and what do the PLP have to offer. A bit of black pride ideology, getting back at Massa, today’s immigrants don’t buy that. Only the populations who as Thomas Szasz said, “… Prefer a meaningless collective guilt to a meaningful individual responsibility.” Today’s PRC’s knows that under the former PLP Government, they can be expelled for political reasons; they will be accumulating more dept., for political reason. And by “political reason” I mean, to stay in power. “Do you understand that “they” understand? …That they know that if 1,500 PRC’s are added to the rolls, there is a good chance the PLP will never regain power – at least not in our lifetimes.“ Dr. Ewart Frederick Brown, Jr.
I’m sure the founding fathers of the PLP were similar to the shipbuilders of the 17th century. “Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.” Henry David Thoreau
― Abraham Lincoln
They wanted to compete; these men did not have limitations about race, color. They were fearless creators with pride and strength. The 17th century Company and the “forty thief’s” did not want to give up their advantage. So a fight for survival was on.
But something got confused. Did you want justice for labor or justice for color? Comparing the platform of the PLP and UBP they share a lot of similarities electoral reform abolition of property vote and the installation of universal adult suffrage for all Bermudians twenty-one years of age and over at the top of both parties.
Some enterprising Bermudian’s figured out that with a majority of black folks they can win the popular vote. And just like today if you control the Government you control the economy or who profits from it. Of course not all Bermudians felts that way. The majority of the population went to the poles to elect a UBP government; a government that realized that Bermuda business will survive, if black people are part of the economy. Even if you were an intolerant racist bigot you’ll realize that your money was in jeopardy.
The black Bermudians couldn’t be excluded. Like the shipbuilders of the pass; labor was the new economy. For: tourism, support for IB, and a healthy environment to live and work. The alternative is a country divided by color. And in 1960’s the fear of riots looms high. The new leader of the UBP Sir Henry “Jack” Tucker realized his party could not run this country and prosper without the participation of all its citizens, blacks. It’s not different from today. Well, except for the Master Slave morality: The master morality creates to gain strength; the slave morality uses guilt to gain strength or Slave morality values things like humility and sympathy, while master morality values pride, strength.
Ideology is how you win an election; you have to convince a group that they are different and that you can help them because they’re victims. An ideology must be constantly created and verified in social life; if it is not, it dies. “Wake up! And see that the jobs to be had are not being given to us.” Dr. Ewart Frederick Brown, Jr.
And so, some say, it’s important for me to understand that Bermuda’s history is built on the foundation of white supremacy if I want to know “Bermuda history” the slave morality, sympathy entitlement for black people. And this is the big lie in Bermuda. For thieves with their salve morality hijacked the ounce great strong-willed brave founders of PLP labor movement, the master morality, the lawbreakers the freemen men of liberty. Their legacy now is recounted, as “second class citizens” by a slave moralist for political reason to generations of Bermudians who believe their humility their color entitles them.
