Focusing on Symptoms - November 2023
This article was published in the November 2023 issue of the Youngstown Buckeye Review, a locally owned black publication.
We focus more on the symptoms of a disease (i.e., a problem) than the disease (problem). Though symptoms can be deadly and shouldn’t be ignored, true healing and wellbeing come from dealing with the disease. Racism, classism, genderism, sexism, and other forms of oppression are symptoms of a disease long ignored. From USA Slavery to the Civil War to the 1860’s Civil Rights Movement (the first Reconstruction) to the Black Codes and final removal of Indigenous People to Jim Crow to the 1960’s Civil Rights Movement (the second Reconstruction) to the Powell Memo and the current Make America Great Again (Jim Crow redux), we’ve witnessed the vile, immoral, and deadly racialized symptoms of the ignored disease.
THE IGNORED DISEASE is the mindset of consume-or-be-consumed. The “consumer mindset” turns everything into commodities and relationships become binary transactions of us-versus-them, me-versus-the-world, and I-want-I-don’t-want”. It programs us to view the world in terms of threats to survival; producing negative FARTs (feelings, actions, reactions, and thoughts) for one another. Wars and autocracies “consuming” the land, labor, liberty, freedom, and dignity of the masses are the more deadly symptoms of this disease.
To be clear, long before the invention of race and white supremacy, the “consumer mindset” disease existed even in our beloved ancient Kemet [otherwise there wouldn’t have been a need for the wisdom teaching in the 7 Principles and 42 ideals of Ma’at; indeed, the Ten Commandments were about overcoming the “consumer mindset” disease.]
THE CURE is to end the “consumer mindset” disease by calling upon ancient Kemetian wisdom teaching. This means seeing one another as Producers made in the image and likeness of the phenomenal production powers of the universe. It means abolishing everything about the consumer and utilizing Producer language to think, talk, and make decisions about EVERYTHING. The main Producer ideas are: 1) life is about Inputs producing Outputs; 2) Inputs come from the people, places, things, and ideas we’ve encountered since birth; 3) we utilize the Inputs to produce our Outputs of FARTs (feelings, actions, reactions, and thoughts); 4) Inputs assessed as threats to survival and flourishing produce negative FARTs; positive FARTs are produced when Inputs are assessed as contributions to survival and flourishing; 5) Inputs and our produced FARTs are stored in our Vectors (e.g., Mommy Vector, Daddy Vector, Vectors for relatives, friends, and others, Vectors for things, places, beliefs, values, interests, and all other ideas); and 6) Who Am I? I am a Producer whose current life is a function of the Inputs and my produced FARTs stored in my huge number of Vectors. [For details see producerconsciousness.com.]
We’ve been “miseducated.” Far too long our focus has been on symptoms. Producer language gives us moral, spiritual, psychological, economic, and ecological narratives to overcome the “consumer mindset” disease and its vile, immoral, and deadly symptoms of racism, classism, genderism, sexism, and other forms of oppression. With a Producer mindset we can begin viewing the world in terms of contributions to survival and flourishing; we can begin producing positive FARTs for one another.