What Should it Mean to be Haitian in 2014

“My decision to destroy the authority of the blacks in Saint Domingue (Haiti) is not so much based on considerations of commerce and money, as on the need to block forever the march of the blacks in the world.” – Napoleon Bonaparte

These words by Napoleon Bonaparte prior to his embarking to crush the revolution sparked by African slaves in what he then considered his French Colony, now known as Haiti, are of significant importance for several reasons. The most telling importance is that what Napoleon is sharing, as a man who is considered to this day as one of the greatest military minds in the history of Western Civilization, is that the his ultimate motivation was purely White Supremacy. The Haitians had already decimated a huge British military expedition, killing over 10,000 British soldiers in less than two months, and repelled incursions by the Spanish Crown. Napoleon was determined to keep over 500,000 Black people in bone crushing bondage in order to keep the lie of justified White domination over the affairs of the world alive.

The importance of Haiti in choking the life out of that lie forevermore has not ceased. What Haitian people must understand is that our existence and history as a people is rooted in being a painful and uncomfortable reminder to the Western world that on January 1, 1804, White Supremacy died a humiliating death, if at least for one day.

In 2014 our identity as Haitians should be grounded in knowing that the slander and degradation against us about our poverty, alleged political incompetence, and poor educational infrastructure is tied to the persistent desire of our historical enemies to wipe our revolution from our minds and the rest of the world’s. Every Haitian child that goes unfed, woman that goes uncared for, or school that goes unbuilt results from the persistent need to delegitimize our history, undermine our sovereignty, and destabilize our governments. The loss Haiti caused to the Imperial masters of the world has not ceased their undying need to punish us for our daring to be free. We cannot believe that merely because our revolution seems so removed from history that they have forgotten.