When I can’t find anything on TV worth watching, I frequently turn to my DVD collection to select something I know meets my standards. So I went through the pile and came across Roots, a mini-series from the mid 70s that caused quite a stir. Without going into much detail, Roots is the saga of an American family that traces the family history of a an African warrior named Kunta Kinte from the time he was captured in West Africa to the day his decedents settled in Henning Tennessee as freed people.
I was in grade school when this mini-series was first shown. So I understood with the mind of a 12 year old boy. Some of my friends got mad watching it, while others didn’t get upset at all.
But, looking at the film again as a 48 year old man, I can’t help seeing an analogy that still exists to this day.
Kunta, was born in freedom. It was all he knew, and to him it was the way his life ought to be. Fiddler, an American-born slave who was charged with teaching Kunta how to be a slave, didn’t know anything but living in bondage.
Their mindsets were completely different.
Kunta couldn’t accept living as a slave and his thoughts dwelled on escaping the plantation. Fiddler, on the other hand, couldn’t understand why Kunta wanted to flee the plantation at all. He wanted to keep the status quo of eating in the Big House, sleeping on pine floors in his cabin, and in his words saying, “That’s high livin’ for a nigga!”, and didn’t want Kunta to jeopardize all he worked for.
As a child, I thought Fiddler was a fool. But, looking at him now with more maturity, he wasn’t a fool at all. It’s not fair for me to fault a man for not yearning for freedom, if he never knew what freedom was.
Today, however the “Fiddler” mentality is still alive and well in the Black community because if you’re born Black, you have no choice of which political party one is supposed to support. The idea of independent and free political thought is quickly vanquished, not by the Overseer’s whip, but by rolled eyes and cutting words like “Uncle Tom”, “Oreo Cookie”, and the dreaded “Wannabe White”.
So I apologize for expecting more political Kunta Kintes yearning for freedom of thought. If that’s all you know, then that’s all you know.
Thanks, Fiddler, for setting me straight.
