Continuing Imperialism Government and Religious Tactics

Spotlight: Continuing Imperialism Government and Religious Tactics

Examples of colonialism and imperialism are not lacking in the news, but for one living in a society that practices these tactics on the world (including their own citizens), they can be difficult to recognize. Hopefully, by becoming more aware of examples of such practices, we will be able to recognize when we are victims of these oppressions.

US CHURCH AIDS HOSPITALS AND PRISONS

The Liberia branch of the LOCASHA Evangelical Lutheran Church (based in the USA) is concentrating on helping hospitals and prisons in the country. Reverand Ernest L. Yarmeto, the head of the ministry in Liberia, has imported goods through the ministry's founder and president, Reverend Garswa Yarmeto, who lives in New Jersey. LOCASHA representatives say that these projects are a way for the church to contribute to distressed individuals. Goods are distributed to inmates at prison centers and to sick people in hospitals.

While the members of the church sincerely view these projects as a way to help others, the real agenda of the church is clear: recruitment. Isn't it interesting how many people suddenly "find God" while incarcerated or sick? Isn't it even more interesting that a church is targeting these vulnerable people to spread its propaganda? Yes, it is interesting, but hardly surprising, as the same tactics occur everywhere. For example, a sign outside of a Chicago train station on Western and Lake reads: "Going to the hospital or jail? Call for prayer!"

IMMIGRANT SLAVES

One would think that modern countries would be diligently working to improve their image in the eyes of the world, especially on the subject of slavery. This is obviously not one of the primary concerns of the system, which continues to preoccupy itself with its power and domination of others in the world. Meanwhile, while they point fingers at others for human rights issues, they are committing the same acts that they accuse of others. Then came the Katrina hurricane, and with it came the destruction of New Orleans..a city that now needs to be rebuilt. While finding people to do the white-collar work is not an issue, finding people to do the menial jobs - the cleaning, roofing, cooking, etc - is more challenging. 

Jesse Jackson found himself on television, telling the world that he was taking a bus of Black people to New Orleans to find work. How noble. Perhaps Jackson did not know of the conditions in New Orleans. Perhaps he did not know that scientists were saying the waters, soil, and environment were contaminated with gasoline, disease, and waste. Maybe Jackson did not think that, by toting Black people to the destroyed city, he was encouraging the current system and its perceptions of which color of people should be doing which jobs…

Those with any intelligence see this situation for what it is: exploitation. Black people and other people of color, especially immigrants, have been brought to the Gulf Coast for cleanup. They have been promised rather small wages for their labor, but wages nonetheless. They do the dangerous work that is "beneath" others, and they do so happily and willingly because they need to work and feed their families. But - and this comes as no surprise - they are being stiffed. After Katrina hit, Armando Ojeda paid a total of $2,400 to be smuggled into the USA and to Mississippi to work. Ojeda's task was dangerous and included the cleanup and clearing of hurricane-strewn junk. He was promised $7 an hour for his trouble.

Six weeks later, Ojeda has not been paid.

Karen Tovar, the subcontractor responsible for Ojeda and many others, admitted that she has not been able to pay several workers. She owes dozens of workers over $130,000, and blames those responsible for paying her, often the USA Army Corps of Engineers the US Government). Tovar also had 83 workers cleaning the Navy base under a $12 million contract held by KBR (owned by Halliburton, Dick Cheney's former company). After many weeks without many workers left. Meanwhile, an Army Corps spokesman reported that he was not aware of payment issues, and KBR referred questions to the Navy. Tovar also brushes off worker complaints as their fault - she claims that they are complaining because they do not understand American pay schedules.

Mississippi does not have a labor department. Nonpayment of wages is not a crime under Mississippi law, and wage issues are deferred to the Federal Department of Labor. Workers have started to organize themselves and take action - Mississippi Immigrant's Rights Alliance prepared complaints for more than 150 workers who are owed more than $100,000 by five contractors. 

Four Guatemalan workers cleaned a school for 144 hours at a promised $8/hour. After their work was completed, one of their bosses gathered them up, put them in the car, and drove a bit before dropping them off on the side of the road, without food and without being paid.

This country was built on slave labor. Perhaps it is naive to think that we have made progress in this area - thousands of workers in New Orleans tell us that the days of slavery are not yet over.

CHURCH USURPS BOYS INITIATION

Female circumcision has been attacked for many years, and African colonial governments are succumbing to the pressures of modernized nations to eradicate the traditional spiritual practice.

Westerners who have no concept of the reasons or value behind excision have managed to passionately convince puppet African leaders that the practice is immoral, unnecessary, and dangerous. Churches are now offering alternative Initiation for boys, which includes the rite of circumcision, but in a "sterile and clean" environment.

"Since the year 2001, we have taken close to 4,500 boys through the alternative rite of passage and the current demand for this program is great," says Haggai Nderu, program facilitator of the Eldoret Presbyterian Church in Kenya. She is at war with traditional Initiation and methods of circumcision. "I call them dangerous because, through them, the deadly HIV/AIDS virus can easily be passed onto our children right under our noses. Who will take the blame for it if not us? There is also evidence that the traditional methods have transformed boys into chauvinists, young men who will not take instruction from their parents or seniors and instead opt for their own way of living, ending up in self-destruction." 

The passing of AIDS to children through traditional circumcision? Forming chauvinists who are pig-headed and irresponsible? Nderu is speaking like a Western puppet who has not experienced Initiation first-hand! Those who know anything of Initiation (of which much is kept secret to preserve the integrity of the knowledge and practices) are certain of one thing: Traditional Initiation is a highly spiritual experience that teaches Initiates values, culture, spiritual knowledge, and morals. Those who succeed in Initiation become humble, enlightened individuals who keep the morality of the Seventy-Seven Commandments and spiritual principles close to heart. No, it is not Traditional Initiation that produces chauvinistic and diseased men, it is the cancer of the Western system that ensures this outcome.

"When December approaches, parents come to church to register their children for circumcision. We first counsel them about what they are about to go through before a qualified doctor performs the circumcision." The boys are allowed to heal during the first week of the "neo-initiation" rite, followed by a second week of counseling and teaching. And what are the boys learning? The church teaches citizenship, personal hygiene, manhood, youth and money, effective schooling, time management, career guidance, cults and occults, tradition, HIV/AIDS, STDs, gender relations, drugs, and community service.

Wow.

It should be noted that Traditional Initiation has been a way of life for hundreds of thousands of years in Africa. No respectable man or woman would deny themselves or their children of their spiritual education (Initiation)...that is, until the White man decided that these practices were bizarre, barbaric, and dangerous. Now, instead of retreating to the bush to learn of spiritual laws and realities, herbs and healing, morality and ethics, and how to be a good person,

boys head to the church to be brainwashed into being servants of the system who are afraid of their own selves and heritage.