Post # 247       A MARRIAGE AND A NEW AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT

Having been reared in the national credo, “All men are created equal,” we have paid little heed to the affairs of the British royalty and are sanguine concerning matters of pomp and ceremony, from any source, as demonstrative assertions of a nation’s purported greatness. However, we are fortunate in having amended our usual resolve, and witnessed the television transmission of the marriage of Prince Harry, of England to the American, Ms. Meghan Markle. Our thoughts went well beyond the beauty of the ceremony, performed in the historical Anglican Cathedral where English royalty has historically celebrated their marriages. Our spirits soared, in the appreciation of what such an eventful wedding signified, historically and sociologically, for mankind’s progress toward peace and human justice. Ms. Markle, a commoner, is black and beautiful, but uncontrovertibly black. They will be known as the Duke and Duchess of Surrey (after the late Duchess of Surrey ,who opposed slavery.)

We find it quite remarkable, that a European nation which has so exalted and taken pride in its historic tradition, as exemplified by the consistent perpetuation of its medieval pomp and ceremony, can now be recognized as the innovator of a vitally needed and dramatic step toward racial justice. While many American television viewers are still socially adjusting themselves to inter-racial commercials, England, who, not so very long ago espoused the statement that non-whites were white men’s (missionary) burden, has warmly welcomed a non-white young bride to its intimate Royal Family.

As we viewed the imperious Duke of Windsor, (surprisingly and perilously close to looking happy) accompany Meghan down the aisle, we thought of the many novels of the 1800’s, by such great English authors as, Dickens, Trollope, Elliot, Thackeray and Austin, in which people of color, stereotypically, servants, slaves and other “inferiors” were designated as “blackamoors”; Queen Victoria must be agitating in her grave with disbelief. King Leopold of Belgium, under whose tutelage of the Congo, hands of black slaves, working in the rubber plantations, were punitively amputated and kept as warnings to others [ See: “Leopold’s Ghost”, or Conrad’s, “Heart of Darkness,”] is another demonstrable example of the unenviable status of black people in Europe. In our country, self- styled, “The land of the free,” it was not so long ago that The Supreme Court of The United States, ruled that black slaves, legally, were agricultural equipment and that, accordingly, run-aways could be returned to their owner [Dred Scott Case].

The wedding was a happy and romantic event, but, historically, a giant step toward a better and more exemplary future for mankind. In addition to the traditional English royal pomp and ceremony, the wedding’s program explicitly and markedly articulated a black presence. In addition to the attendance of black guests, including of course, the bride’s mother, one of the sermons was delivered by a black minister (episcopal); members of the wedding entourage were black, there was a black solo cellist and a black American Gospel Choir singing “Stand By  Me.”. While we, in the US, are busy, gradually adjusting to the novel  inter-racial television commercials, our old, stodgy mother country has forever advanced the worldview as to race relations.

What will the dedicated haters who comprise the White Supremacy groups do now? After all, one clearly, cannot be “whiter” than a member the English Royalty. We have especial pleasure, in imagining the mind- set of those low information, flat earth bigots, who ignorantly see themselves as “defenders” against the “mongrelizing” of the white race, when they learn that a Royal English Prince married a black American bride with mankind’s universal approval.  From this day forward, they will only have their bald heads, Nazi flags and tattoos to be proud of, and not their skin color.

[Our sincerest congratulations to the happy bride and groom.]

-p.