Black prejudice
Humphry Berkeley
John Bull's Nigger Dillibe Onyeama (Leslie Frewin £2.50)
"Darling, I simply can't wait to be black," was. my greeting some years ago at a multi-racial
party from my hostess Molly Huggins whose former husband had been Governor of Jamaica. This was one of her better sayings, though it does not rival her description of her husband's second wife as "Like me, darling, only larger."
There is no such lightness of touch in this nauseating little book. Mr Onyeama, an old
Etonian, writes, -being black altogether
shames me," and "to me the black man is more of an animal only marginally human." Un consciously, though trying to insult the black man, he is in fact insulting the animal. Almost all the animals that I have known well or observed, whether they be black, white or coloured, have been infinitely nicer than humans with a standard of behaviour which with few exceptions is substantially higher than that of people. I have never met an animal who has invented a bomb, let alone placed one in the Tower of London with the object of killing innocent victims. Animals do not hi-jack planes or mug harmless people, nor do I know of any animals who kill other animals because they belong to the wrong religious sect or because they are Marxists or capitalists. Animals are in my experience relatively tolerant individuals who kill to eat rather than for pleasure. They are also totally without racial prejudice, which is more than can be said about Mr Onyeama.
I once attended an election meeting in Rhodesia, which was addressed by the Duke of Montrose, who for egalitarian reasons prefers to be addressed as Lord Graham, The African was, so he told us, a nice jolly friendly little fellow until he reached the age of thirteen.
Then something called puberty happened. "After that he can't concentrate for more than thirty seconds on anything but sex. It's our women he's after." His wife was sitting on the platform beside him as he spoke. Her appear ance might have been described as statuesque rather than sultry. I thought of the countless times that she and Lord Graham must have heard the thudding of feet down many a dark lane, the numerous cases of the discovery of dusky limbs hidden beneath the marital couch and the reason for the small jewelled pistol placed under her pillow at nightfall. At least Lord Graham was concerned to protect the virtue of his wife. Mr Onyeama is attempting a somewhat less noble task, that of systematically and deliberately violating the reputation of his fellow blacks in the realms of sex, hygiene, moral conduct, honesty and intellect.
This book is an incoherent, repetitive, vicious and untrue description of the behaviour of the black man at home and in this country. Had I not been asked by The Spectator to review it, I should have put it down after ten minutes, not through disgust but out of sheer boredom, since I learned nothing new about Mr Onyeama's views about his fellow blacks after reading his book from cover to cover in one hour flat. Black people are noisy, dirty, drunken, violent, immoral, unintelligent rapists with a deep persecution complex. I have said in one sen tence what Mr Onyeama has spun into one hundred and fifty-nine pages at a price of £2.50. I cannot even recommend the book as useful ammunition for the members of the National Front, since even the most bigoted member of that movement knows that the anti-social behaviour catalogued above can be pinned on a minority of any race. Fortunately, thousands of white people have lived among Africans and know, from first hand experience, that there is never a need in an African village for an orphanage or an Old People's Home. In this sphere at least African tradition is superior to Western materialism.
I have heard men describe their sexual experiences, but seldom is so naive a way as "To me the white girl is like a goddess of beauty. • • When she lies submissively on my bed exposing her naked body she makes my flesh cry out for hers, and my need for her is irresistible. There is no such thing as an ugly white girl, even if she is bald-headed, cross-eyed and has only one black tooth she's still beautiful. Put a black girl on my bed, however, and all my personal instincts would rebel. Here's the goddess of ugliness. The black girl is a loud-mouthed, hard-muscled machine full of vigour and resilience, too much on the masculine side, not quiet, weak and submissive like the white girl." All right but so what?-He prefers them white. I must confess that I have never met a white, bald-headed, cross-eyed girl with only one black tooth. The Duchess of Montrose certainlY has a fine head of hair. Mr Onyeama displays a frightening ignorance of the behaviour of the white man when he writes about the civil wars in Africa, and especially Biafra, and blames black men for what has happened. "The world has witnessed savage atrocities in these tribal wars massacres, crucifixions, mutilations, cannibalism, disembowelment of innocent men, pregnant women plus other unutterable forms of torture." Has he never heard of the Spanish Inquisition, the extermination of the Jews by the Nazis, concentration camps, the atrocities in Northern Ireland, and the dropping of two nuclear tombs on Japan?
The most unpleasant black man I have ever met was the late and unlamented Malcolm X. Mr Onyeama makes him appear as a person of benevolent charm and Christian charity by comparison. I hope I shall be spared an encounter with him.
Humphry Berkeley, formerly Conservative MP for Lancaster, is now a member of the Labour Party and is looking for a seat
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