NiLP Note: With the recent heated controversies over the National Puerto Rican Day Parade and the Puerto Rico status plebiscite on his mind, this week Felipe Luciano wrote us that "I've been struggling with these thoughts for weeks. This article comes from my heart. It's what I really feel. Damn the consequences!"
Felipe Luciano, himself a controversial figure, currently co-hosts The Morning Show on WBAI-FM with MG Haskins on Fridays from 6 to 8 am. The 70-year-old Luciano is an American poet, community activist, journalist, media personality, motivational speaker and politician. He was a member of the Original First Poets, a co-founder of The Young Lords in New York and even served time in prison for manslaughter.
---Angelo Falcón
Die Spic, So Puerto Ricans Can Take Over
For over a century, I've seen you scrape your knees to please your
master. He has beaten you in public and humiliated you in private, taking
your land, taking your children to die in his wars or wallow in prison.
He's a master brain washer, making you think you can't live without his love, his money, his approval. You've become a slave, addicted to thinking that without him you are nothing, just a brown speck of humanity he picked up on his way to controlling the world. And, though your neighbors set themselves free in the Caribbean, you played the role of battered spouse, black-eyed, tattered and bruised, screaming " He didn't mean it; I provoked him. He really loves me. He said he wouldn't do it again."
But, he does. Again and again, taking the money you gave him, believing the lies of inferiority and unworthiness, he whispers while he's on top of you, only to leave you before dawn, so the neighbors don't see his exit. But, they do and finally, the entire community realizes you don't really want to break free, you just like to talk about it once the rejection sets in; you are sick and addicted to abuse. They can't help you because you won't help yourself. And, unless you stop asking for permission to be free, stand up, order him to leave and cut him long, deep and serious, if he tries to beat you or your kids, you will stay a colored whore.
Spic, you need to die. Your ay bandito excuses for his craven greed and lewdness have made you into a colonial mental case. You want to be a white American. You tell yourself, if I can't see freedom and equality, maybe the children I have with him, will experience it. So you distance yourself from your color and your natural consciousness and beat your children when they even mention killing this monster. You tell them they can't win that they're weak and unable to resist in any meaningful way and, anyway, you can't hit your father back. You wanna' bet?
You need to die. You need to step aside and let Puerto Ricans, born on the streets of struggle and resistance, take over. We may not have the education or finesse or Spanish language skills that the new breed of island imports have, but, most of them have no street sense, no character, no roots in the projects and tenements and only show courage when they think the "liberal" master approves of their tactics. They collapse when the battle gets rough; they have no real will to fight to the end because of they too have a vested interest in the lie of colonialism. They know they will get their rewards whether street people live or die, whether Puerto Rico becomes a state or independent. They are the true spics. They believe in martyrs, not warriors.
I didn't want to say this publicly, didn't want to vomit this sickness in front of family, but, I can't hold it in any longer. Spic, you need to die or get the hell out of the way and let the Puerto Ricans who fought for the rights of every Latino in this country, move forward and do what must be done. You don't ask for freedom, you take it. And you don't turn back because of a few setbacks and defeats. If you make a decision and you know it's right, stick with it. You don't need outside approval, only God's and He/She's inside of you.
Those spics who want to be white and identify as white Americans, let them go. Those who know their history, who have seen what the great white father did to Albizu Campos, to Emeterio Betances, to the family of Juan Mari Bras, to FUPI, to MPI, to Oscar Lopez Rivera, and yes, to the Young Lords, must not lose heart. This is the time and the task we were born for, and it doesn't matter how much time you've spent in jail, rehab, unemployment or food stamp programs. You are the salt of the Earth, of Puerto Rico, of New York City, of Chicago, of Philadelphia, of Cleveland, of Reading, of Orlando and all the other cities we reside in.
The real devil is doubt, despair, and depression. We must fight through these demons with Faith; 'ya gotta have it. And stop listening to dream killers. WE WILL WIN. It'll be dirty, and lives will be lost, but dammit', it's NATION TIME. And we've got our children, our visitors and God on our side.
Spic, you need to die and be born again. Puerto Ricans will take over from here on in.