It’s that time of the year again – the month where the world unites to celebrate black history. It’s supposed to be a grand affair about black people embracing their roots and teach the rest of the world about the culture. However, there’s that one controversy someone always opens and let overshadow black history. Every year, every February, many people voice their opinion about black history month having to compete with other events for the shortest month of the year. It doesn’t only take attention away from the culture we’re supposed to be celebrating and shortens the amount of cultural facts we try to squeeze in such a short time. It also hurts our pride to feel that the world doesn’t care enough to want to know more about the culture and truly dedicate time to learn and understand it.
Personally, I think this fact should not matter. Most of us already celebrate our culture on a daily basis and in every aspect of our lives. So, it doesn’t matter what time the world wants to acknowledge us or how much of their attention they want to give us. We embrace black history with every little positive thing any of us do every day of our lives.
Also, sharing a month with Valentine’s Day may be a good thing. February is already seen as the month of love therefore black history can benefit from the connotation and be viewed as a history of love. That’s all we’ve been fighting for, isn’t it? To be seen as the others and be loved like them. We are a culture of love and friendship. Looking back at Ancient Africa or even modern day Africa, we can see the closeness of the clan and family. This is what we’re all about – loving and staying together.
I think it’s high time we look at February as a blessing rather than the result of an afterthought by those who did us wrong. It will only sting if we look at the bad side of the subject – the world has less days to focus on our accomplishments. It’s their loss, not ours. We know what we’re worth and we bring to the table. Not only February is Abraham Lincoln’s birthday – the man whose actions led to a great victory – it’s also the month that shines the truth on us without knowing. It’s the second month of the year which means we can use this time to have a rudimentary shape of how we’ll impact the rest of the year.
I don’t think any other month could have ever done us so much justice like February has done. It’s our special month and we should care for it and profit of the opportunity we have presented to us. Enjoying the 28/29 days we have is so much more refreshing than being mad at the two or three days it’s missing. Why should it matter how long black history month last if we are always celebrating our blackness on our own every day of the year?
Photo credits: Icanbeco.tumblr.com