I am not going to lie, I fell for it.
The lie gave me the confirmation that our self-hatred for one another as a “race” was deep-rooted in the conditioning of our ancestor’s masters. This gave me the answer to where the word “lynch” came from. This lie secured my belief that “we black folks need to wake up” and that maybe this year, we might just awake from a sweeping slumber.
Advertisement
However, I think as African Americans, we claim rigor mortis in our community a little too quickly. We’re not dead, yet.
Three hundred years ago, in 1712, a British slave master supposedly named Willie Lynch allegedly wrote a letter and read a speech to slave owners in the colony of Virginia. In the letter “Willie Lynch” states that he is there to teach his effective methods from the West Indies on how to control the slaves. “Lynch” says that he has the secret method in a bag that will keep slaves maintained for 300 years. In an excerpt from the speech, Willie Lynch allegedly told the white masters that,
“My method is simple. Any member of your family or your overseer can use it. I HAVE OUTLINED A NUMBER OF DIFFERENCES AMONG THE SLAVES; AND I TAKE THESE DIFFERENCES AND MAKE THEM BIGGER. I USE FEAR, DISTRUST AND ENVY FOR CONTROL PURPOSES. These methods have worked on my modest plantation in the West Indies and it will work throughout the South. Take this simple little list of differences and think about them. On top of my list is “AGE,” but it’s there only because it starts with an “a.” The second is “COLOR” or shade. There is INTELLIGENCE, SIZE, SEX, SIZES OF PLANTATIONS, STATUS on plantations, ATTITUDE of owners, whether the slaves live in the valley, on a hill, East, West, North, South, have fine hair, course hair, or is tall or short.
“Now that you have a list of differences, I shall give you an outline of action, but before that, I shall assure you that DISTRUST IS STRONGER THAN TRUST AND ENVY STRONGER THAN ADULATION, RESPECT OR ADMIRATION. The Black slaves after receiving this indoctrination shall carry on and will become self-refueling and self-generating for HUNDREDS of years, maybe THOUSANDS. Don’t forget, you must pitch the OLD black male vs. the YOUNG black male, and the YOUNG black male against the OLD black male. You must use the DARK skin slaves vs. the LIGHT skin slaves, and the LIGHT skin slaves vs. the DARK skin slaves. You must use the FEMALE vs. the MALE, and the MALE vs. the FEMALE. You must also have white servants and overseers [who] distrust all Blacks. But it is NECESSARY THAT YOUR SLAVES TRUST AND DEPEND ON US. THEY MUST LOVE, RESPECT AND TRUST ONLY US.”
The most interesting thing about this controversial letter and “speech” is that over the years not that many people have rebutted its authenticity. As a matter of fact, several African Americans take this short, simplistic document as gospel. Even Louis Farrakhan mentioned the speech during the 1995 Million Man March.
Interestingly, the letter “appeared” not too long before 1995. According to Professor Manu Ampim of Merritt College in Oakland, California, a University of Missouri reference librarian first found the anonymous sent speech on the internet. It was then printed in a locally available publication called The St. Louis Black Pages in 1994.
Oh…the wonders of the good ol’ reliable internet!From then on, the word on “Willie Lynch” and his mechanisms on how to maintain slaves spread like wildfire; it happened to reach thousands and thousands of African American people. Many people believed all of it despite the several anachronisms that appear in the text such as the 20th century words “self-refueling” and “fool-proof” and the social-historical context of the South in 1712 (think about it for a minute). If you really look into the whole letter with a keen eye, you will see even more strange occurrences throughout. It has lead well educated scholars like Professor Manu Ampim to conclude that this is a work of 21st Century fiction.
So, what’s the lesson for the day?It’s simple, don’t believe everything you hear. Yes, I am aware that uncovering this letter for the first time will be like finding gold mine full of precious gold to some, but in reality there is not much substance to it when it’s fabricated. As Professor Manu Ampim stated,
“While we are distracted by the Willie Lynch urban mythology, the real issues go ignored. There are a number of authentic first-hand written accounts by enslaved Africans, who wrote specifically about the slave conditions and the slavemasters’ system of control. For example, writers such as Olaudah Equiano, Mahommah Baquaqua, and Frederick Douglass wrote penetrating accounts about the tactics of slave control.”
When you really do your research, you realize that the white slave masters of the past did not think on individual characteristics such as skin color, age, gender as much as this letter entails; they relied on an overall sense of power, respect, and superiority to hold their ground. Sure we can say that institutionalized racism and mental slavery are alive and well, but the truth is, we are not going to find the root of our age-old dilemma in a short letter written by one white man.