My intellectual genealogy is not traceable to Europe or any European thinker. Similarly, my position on the politics of most things can be summed up as the “maroon” position, that is the position of those Africans who, so determined to escape chattel slavery, that they fled the plantations and established free and independent communities in the swamps, hills, caves, and so on of the so-called “New World”.
Not content to be free while others suffered, many of the maroons would often wage war against the system of slavery. The maroons were advocates of African self-determination. They were advocates for the preservation and adaptation of African cultures and traditions. They realized that institution building was vital to their survival, thus they sustained families, grew food, defended their territories and so on. Their logic could be summed up as follows: The only means whereby we can fully actualize optimal living conditions for our people, is to live free of foreign domination.
Again, as stated, my position on most things is the maroon position. I see no separation between the imperatives of our ancestors and ourselves.