Tom Lee - Worthy Negro

A week and one day ago, I visited Memphis Tennessee.  My significant and I partook in the TSU vs. JSU festivities (Southern Heritage Classic).  The weekend was mostly for my soul mate to enjoy.  I’m not that big on football any longer. The day of our departure, my significant other wanted to visit the riverfront.  I was okay with that.  It’s a beautiful site and also now, named the Tom Lee Park.  I wasn’t aware that the name of the river park is named Tom Lee Park and that Tom Lee is a black man.  Discovering Tom Lee was another black history moment for us.

We took the opportunity to view and read the statues/monument of Tom Lee.  He was an honorable man of integrity from what I can see and understand.  But here’s what got next to me and my significant other.  On the monument, Tom Lee was a, “a worthy negro.”  When I read that part, it took me off guard with a head role and all.  It stated, exactly that he was  “ a worthy negro” because Tom took it upon himself to rescue several white men who capsized in 1925.   

That’s good, I suppose.  We were very flabbergasted at the wording, “worthy negro.”  Hmmm.  If he’s a worth negro, what are the rest of the negros?  Unworthy?  I feel that this monument is dated and should be changed to say, “he was an honorable man of integrity.”  Yes; I understand that in the days of old black people were called negros.  We went from the n-word (still considered the N-word) to negros.  From Negros to colored.  From colored to black people.  Now, society in America is so stupid because descents from slaves referred as “African Americans.”  Yes, people; that is stupid.  Very stupid.  In order to be called African American, you must be born in Africa. It’s obvious that blacks at one time stolen from Africa, but they were not born there.   If you are born on American soil, you are American.  It doesn’t matter your parents’ origin. The first slave bone in America is American.  However, that is another blog for another week.

Getting back to Tom Lee; I’m still perturbed over the term, “worthy negro.”  What negro has ever been unworthy?  I just would like to know. Because during slavery, and during Jim Crowe, we Black people had no choice in following the rules.  Even if blacks followed the rules, they were either beaten, hung, raped, sodomized, or castrated.  So, if Tom Lee is a worthy Negro, what are blacks considered modern day?

Think about it.