PTSDs

In the Spirit of the Gracious and Compassionate
Creator of the Heavens and the Earth

We are all suffering from PTSDs — post-traumatic stress disorders. Not just one, but many.

For the general public, the biggest one, I think, is the result of twelve or thirteen years of compulsory public schooling. As a result, we hate math, hate history, hate literature and the arts, and hate the sciences — all of which would be endlessly fascinating otherwise.

African Americans suffer PTSDs inherited by way of the wombs and the loins caused by the Middle Passage, plantation slavery and its more brutal aftershocks (1865-1875), Jim Crow, the campaign of lynchings, segregation, red-lining, employment discrimination, and other abuses. These need to be acknowledged and addressed. These PTSDs have a greater effect determining the condition and position of African Americans in society than the attitudes and actions of white Americans, however hateful they may be. And, yes, trauma is passed down from generation to generation.

Compulsory schooling contributes to these PTSDs by deliberately ignoring them and even being — by way of segregation, for example — one of the causative factors. And, of course, the deliberate teaching of lies and omitting necessary truth is also traumatic, even when it does not feel traumatic. It causes injury that spreads through the society and follows us through life and down through the generations. Multiple, combinatorial, metastasizing PTSDs that cripple the entire society. Until the society implodes.

Every one of us needs to study math, history, literature and the arts, and the sciences — not as an enforced drudgery, but as a personal and heartfelt interest. Studying on your own, you might discover that matrix algebra is actually fascinating (as I did), or that the history of the Lunda-Luba conflict in the Congo region is amazing, or that Native Son is a heart-wrenching novel, or that spiral galaxies are awesome. Listening to the first movement of Beethoven’s fifth symphony might even bring you to tears. After years of indulging your passion (yes, passion!), you might discover that you have become an expert in that field.

I believe that the Creator created the human being to study and learn. We are born curious. This is our nature. Until someone — our parents, maybe (and sadly), or the school, or even our playmates — crushes it out of us. We need to fight against this. We need to wage a liberation struggle. We need to recapture our original nature.

Freely studying math, history, art, literature, and the sciences will help us to heal from the wounds and the traumas — the PTSDs — of the Middle Passage (which is the biggest one) and of all of the other injustices inflicted on our people. In addition, you will advance civilization. Yes! Civilization is a multi-ethnic, international, trans-continental endeavor. You will free yourself. And — instead of continuing to be a wage-slave — you might even get rich.

Lester A. Knibbs
7 Rabee’-ul-Aakhir 1447
September 29, 2025