“Free your mind, and your ass will follow.”

-George Clinton

It is significant that at this time of the year those of us who are black conscious are celebrating the 1816 rebellion in Barbados which allowed history to record the bravery of those elite black slaves of the time, the two more famous being Bussa and Nanny Grigg. BU says significant because Black people in Barbados are fighting another form of slavery which seeks to enslave us in a mental and economic bondage which can be described as more dehumanizing than that which was suffered before. We make the observation that many black educated Barbadians join the world and have ignored the plight of a Haiti. In reality Haiti is the only Caribbean island which can hold its head up with pride because it was the only island where black slaves successfully revolted and led a revolution which ultimately led to the removal of the white planter class in Haiti. That revolt historians believe acted as inspiration for the 1816 rebellion and others around the Caribbean. The current state of affairs is that first nations have made Haiti to suffer for that bravery through the years.

We propose to use the parallel argument which recognizes that the freedom of Barbadians to freely exchange information is under threat in 2007. The recent overt and covert actions which have sought to muzzle a leading journalist – David Ellis – in Barbados from asking a legitimate question; even if some would agree it was in bad taste, has acted as a rallying cry for those of us who have pretended that our democracy would perpetuate with little effort from the ordinary citizenry. Perhaps Mr. Tony Audain can let the people know what the Prime Minister had to say to him about the Lynch-Ellis affair. The retreat to the Internet by a public frustrated and upset at the fact that successive governments have done nothing to modernize the slander and libel laws of Barbados which currently shackle the opinions of the populace, can only be described as diabolic in the 21^st century, Bussa and Nanny Grigg must be “turning” in their graves.

We accept that a revolution is a process which can consists of many revolts along the way. We hope that David Ellis and the Barbadian patriots who have sought refuge on the wide world web to facilitate free speech can be characterized as a series of revolts; hopefully one day it can become a revolution which would see the black person in Barbados free, free in mind, soul and body.

We shall overcome

We shall overcome

We shall overcome some day