"I’m a few shots in now, Kendrick’s new civil rights anthem “Alright” is playing and I’m thinking about the stinging irony of a white man calling me a word that means king but when spoken in English, the official language of cultural imperialism, sounds so much like slave.
Recently, negus has been popping up everywhere. Kendrick Lamar’s critically acclaimed To Pimp A Butterfly helped to popularize the word. Yasiin Bey’s track-listing screenshot for his new and alleged last album, provided by Ferrari Sheppard, is tentatively titled: Negus 1. YC the Cynic and the late Capital Steez of the Pro Era crew both have songs called “Negus.”
The sentiment is understandable, and I ain’t trying to knock the aforementioned artists nor black folks in the U.S. that use the word, as I feel their intentions to be true. They trying to reconnect to their African roots, a history that was methodically ripped from them. It’s lightweight a beautiful gesture to use the word. To proclaim, in a society that systematically and ruthlessly degrades black people, that we too are humans – naw fuck that. We kings...
But I do implore people to connect further with the Ethiopian history evoked when using the word, a history that is both beautiful and inspiring in relation to fighting European colonialism, yet marred by a myriad of injustices inflicted upon the masses of regular every-day Ethiopians by a long list of negus...
Selassie presided over a decadent feudal oligarchy with the overwhelming majority of Ethiopians frozen in a serf caste system of servitude and poverty with little to no chance of social mobility. Dissent was not tolerated and was met with torture and public hangings... Some view Selassie as a benevolent ruler who stood up to fascist Italy—a bringer of reforms that pushed Ethiopia onto the path of modernization. Much respect and thanks to homeboy for fighting off the fascists and his eloquent speech pleading for assistance in driving back the invading Italians before the League of Nations but that and the public projects he initiated can not begin to make up for the crimes committed and his propagation of the inhumane system of feudalism well into the twentieth century."
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