Van Lathan celebrates Killmonger in Black History Month

[Dr. Narcisse]

Black people never sold Black people into slavery.

Better said, the idea posited by white supremacy that Black people sold Black people into slavery at the outset of the Transatlantic Slave Trade is an intellectual lie.
African people sold African people into slavery. That much is true. “Black” had nothing to do with it. “Black,” as we know it today, is a unifying diasporic definition that seeks to cement solidarity and foster shared understanding between people of the world who have been impacted by white supremacy.

That didn’t exist then.



It’s true that the idea of “Black” itself was invented with a specific utility in mind. “Black,” as we know it, was invented to designate what is not white, and therefore is subject to being owned by whiteness. In the global capitalist race to colonize and harvest foreign lands for power projection, the designation of “Black” was invented to identify which HUMANS could be harvested to achieve that goal.

But fukk all that. We changed it.

Black, as I understand it, has always been about who I should expect safety from. Black represents the choice of a global people to live freely despite the grotesqueries of invention. The project of the Black diaspora is rebellion. A rebellion that exists to stress the foundation of worldwide white supremacy until the cracks become overwhelming enough for it to crumble, and from that, build something new.

Or better yet, build something new with systems, rules, and traditions all our own. We’ve already done that to a large degree, but I’m talking about something further. I’m talking about power, not safety. You see, in this world, there is no safety without power. If you are constantly asking white supremacy not to hurt you, you’re appealing to its morality. Won’t work. Anyone invested in white supremacy is already immoral; asking them to grow concern is a fool’s errand.

That’s not the way I approach peace. I’d rather be powerful enough to dare someone to hurt me, warning of the consequences after. This appeals to their sense of self-preservation.

When faced with pain or annihilation, peace becomes an easy choice.

This is why I fukk with Erik Killmonger more than any other hero in the Marvel Cinematic Universe … and I mourn him this Black History Month.

If you’ve seen Black Panther, you know how the story goes. T’Challa, the crown prince of the fictional African kingdom of Wakanda, has ascended to the throne after his father, T’Chaka, was killed by Baron Zemo. T’Chaka got hit the way a lot of dudes in Baton Rouge I know got hit: wrong place, wrong time. It can happen to anyone. Anyway, T’Challa must then head back to Wakanda and stabilize the country politically. This is a fraught assignment for three reasons.

One, T’Chaka has ruled for a long time. A long rule can be good for a kingdom, but there are also negatives. When a king rules for an extended period of time, it can create dilemmas in succession. A longer rule can result in the development of rigid familial and political ties over that time. Factions develop, meaning the new king will have to solidify his claim before his rule even begins. This can be bloody.

Two, Wakanda still has ritual combat to choose leaders. This means anyone with fire hands can become King. You need royal lineage, of course, but if you have that, you’re one left hook away from the throne. We see this in the first act of the movie when T’Challa has to fight a defensive tackle before he can be crowned. The suspense of watching a wide receiver fight Aaron Donald for the captaincy of a nation was incredible. Right after our hero prevails, we learn the third reason his young reign was in trouble …

Wakanda has a secret. That secret is Erik Killmonger.

When we meet Erik Killmonger in Black Panther, we think we know him. We see a young Black man with a questionable hairstyle taking part in a heinous crime. The crime itself is supposed to define Killmonger. He, along with veteran MCU baddie Ulysses Klaue, is robbing a London Museum (that looks EXACTLY like the High Museum in Atlanta) of an ancient artifact. The robbery is bloody; they murder people to get it done. It’s also righteous, because, as Killmonger explains in a fantastic piece of writing, what they are stealing was stolen in the first place. The audience knows, both from history and intuition, that the theft Killmonger is detailing was much more vicious and profound than anything we will witness over the next couple of minutes, so the scene’s brutality is somewhat muted by context. The robbery, because of Killmonger’s politics, feels like just retribution and not pure greed.

To sum up, when Killmonger is introduced to us, he seems like a young man who’s doing the wrong thing for what he thinks is the right reason. Furthermore, no matter how bad it goes, there’s nothing he can do that can match what’s been done to him, or the historical and social situation he was born into.

I know that guy.

A Requiem For Erik Kilmonger

Wakanda's Tragic b*stard

vanlathan.substack.com

 

[Dr. Narcisse]

Back to Killmonger. When I say I know that guy, I mean that. I know men whom, if I described to you the events of their lives, you would find those lives abominable. Men, and some boys who never grew to be men, who were capable of violence, usury, and apathy that would seem almost evil. shyt, maybe it was. But I knew them. I knew the hand they were dealt. I knew the ingredients that life cake was baked from. As I grew older and got more diagnoses for my own dysfunction, I began to recognize that dysfunction in men and boys I grew up with. Because of that, I’m probably more invested in the reasons you did the terrible thing you did than other people might be. I’ve cared for too many men and boys whom I know in my bones were more than the decisions they made. It animates my want to keep other young men from making those same mistakes. After we first meet Killmonger in the museum, the character had me; I was ready to ride with him on his perverse journey to oblivion.

Only that wasn’t the first meeting.

We didn’t know it, but we’d already met Killmonger. Black Panther begins with him. The film’s narrative starts with the voiceover of a father recounting the history of their people to his son. That father and son are N’Jobu, Killmonger’s father and the brother of T’Chaka, and a young Killmonger. The story of Wakanda is being told to the audience because that son asked his father to tell it, and he calls it the story of “Home.” So, to a young Killmonger, home is Wakanda, not Oakland, where he was born. Oakland, a place with an essential, almost holy Black cultural imprint, is an away game for Killmonger. His connection to his father makes him identify with the ancient, nigh-omnipotent Wakandan culture, seemingly leaving Too Short and the rest of the Bay ghost riding the bench, Yaddamean.

All that matters because of what happens next to Killmonger. Home kills his father. The inciting incident of Black Panther isn’t something that happened to T’Challa; it’s something that happens to Killmonger. T’Chaka kills N’Jobu for stealing Vibranium, leaving Killmonger fatherless. N’Jobu was stealing the Vibranium to help oppressed people, and, of course, the Wakandans can’t have that (we’ll get to that later), so the nice man from This Is Us had to die.

This leaves Killmonger a cultural orphan. Saddled with the brutality of the country he was born into, tethered to the condition of that country, but tortured by the knowledge that his origin should transcend his circumstance. The moment his father dies, Killmonger’s life becomes a fight. He fights actual wars with fists and bullets, emotional wars with pain and abandonment, and diasporic wars with cultural family he feels have turned their back on him. His angst is an angst of self. It feels like the moment Killmonger knows who he is, he will have the entire thing figured out. Is he supposed to be a nice Oakland brother with a regular haircut and a family? Is he supposed to be the king of Wakanda? Is he supposed to rap? He doesn’t know. All he knows is that the world — literally the world — hurt him, and he has to, he must, he will, hurt them back.

I can relate.

There’s another interesting misconception people have about Black Panther, the movie, that seems evident to me, but that no one agrees with me on. People think Black Panther is a movie about T’Challa becoming the King Of Wakanda. It is not about that at all to me. The moment T’Challa beats M’Baku, he is the King Of Wakanda. He never actually loses to Killmonger, so he remains the King Of Wakanda throughout the whole movie. T’Challa being the King Of Wakanda is a birthright that was always going to be his; he was always going to become that. That journey is not a journey at all. The actual journey of the movie — what the movie is actually about — is clear to me.

Black Panther is about T’Challa becoming a Black man.

Let’s go back to the overwritten beginning of this piece. I established that the identity of “Black” was a unifying diasporic definition. It’s something that seeks to signal some level of solidarity and safety worldwide. After the transatlantic slave trade, Black became a way for people worldwide to join in resistance and love against the scourge of worldwide white supremacy, something that touched Black people wherever they were.

Except for Wakanda.

White supremacy never touched Wakanda, so Wakandans decided not to become Black. Why did white supremacy not touch Wakanda? Vibranium. Vibranium super-powered Wakandan civilization, allowing them to resist. Not only did they resist, they became the richest, most technologically advanced nation in the world. They then made the conscious decision to cut themselves off from the world, including the Black world. This choice was made as the Europeans ran roughshod over the entire globe, delivering disease and destruction whenever they set foot. Why did Wakanda, a nation that could’ve stopped all this, sit on their hands? They did it to hide the Vibranium, to protect their resource.

It’s funny. When the “Eternals” movie came out, one of the big criticisms was that they’d been absent from all of these huge fights in the MCU. Where was this team of Space Gods during Loki’s attack on New York? What about when Ultron tried to destroy the world? Were the Eternals just chilling? No one knew. No Black person I’ve ever met has asked where the Wakandans were during either of those events. They definitely could’ve helped, but who cares? On the other hand, it would’ve been awesome to have some hovercraft during the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Maybe send the Dora Milaje to Tulsa in 1921. Too much trouble to bust up apartheid right in your backyard? Might’ve saved us from Elon Musk. “Where was Wakanda?”

In Black culture, we have a word for people who look like us who won’t lift a finger to help us in the fight for our lives because they feel like they have too much to lose. That word is c00n. If I wanted to, I could actually …

Let’s not.

But I think it’s worth pointing out that T’Challa had no interest in the issues and problems of Black people worldwide until he met Killmonger. Killmonger represented a funhouse mirror reflection to T’Challa, as Black people worldwide represent a funhouse mirror reflection to the Wakandans. T’Challa then challenged the tradition of his culture, imperiled the future of his nation, and realigned the power of the world. Why?

Because he became Black … (and they ain’t stop fighting since, LMAO).

It’s true Killmonger made T’Challa see the plight of the worldwide Black diaspora (Nakia, too). It’s also true that he killed his girlfriend and choked the poor lady who looked after the Heart-Shaped Herb. He also murdered Forrest Whitaker (snitch) and started a civil war in Wakanda. I’m not arguing Killmonger wasn’t a problem. He was. I’m arguing that he had the same type of misused righteousness, the same pseudo-noble rage that I’ve seen out of some brothers my whole life. Killmonger didn’t think he owed the world peace because the world never gave it to him. He wore his kills as scars on his body, and to the uninitiated, they might seem like trophies, like a drill rapper bragging about how many bodies they have. I know what that’s really about. It’s about convincing the world you’re dangerous enough to enforce your safety. It’s about seeing so much death that you accept death as a language.

What I see is Killmonger. Sure, he earned his death, but he should’ve had a better life.

 

[parallax]

im sorry, but no.

 

[Ed MOTHERFUCKING G]

He posts on reddit a lot. He's a really interesting person and expresses what is on his mind be it on tv, podcasts, or writing very well.

 

[In The Zone '98]

His story isnt finished. And needs to be brought back

 

[Squirrel from Meteor Man]

Killmonger was right, but his approach was wrong.

The story was basically Koba vs. Caesar in Planet of the Apes. The sentiment and the idea that the only way for freedom and peace is through war and violence isn’t necessarily untrue, but when you don’t have a thought out plan you quickly devolve into the enemy you want to defeat. You become sick with power and lose your morality.

Killmonger was ready to basically sacrifice any and everybody, including his own people for his own goals. He only knew war and ruling with an iron fist because that’s how he had to survive. You can’t run successful societies that way.

I still rock with him though. He was right about how we were being controlled and oppressed. T’Challa was too diplomatic.

 

[horizon]

All hail king Killmonger

 

[Amerikan Melanin]

Killmonger was right.

I wore a “Killmonger was right” T shirt last time I was at Disney. A lot of people agreed even CACs.

 

[Gloxina]

 

[Seoul Gleou]

Is killmonger a tether or FBA

 

[Buddy]

Is killmonger a tether or FBA

In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Ulysses Klaue and Prince N'Jobu conspired in 1992 to steal Vibranium from Wakanda. N'Jobu, a Wakandan prince disillusioned with isolationism, hired Klaue to steal the metal to arm oppressed people, resulting in the death of many Wakandans and making Klaue a long-time fugitive of the nation.


So Njobu was worse than a Pan Africanist, he was a full on "people of the world unite" globalist & got killed for it. Killmonger picks up his pops' mantle on some by any means shyt and he was right?????

 

[Dr. Narcisse]

All hail king Killmonger

I know people have switched up on the movie, but I still think its great although not perfect. Its too bad it had to be the film before Infinity War. Cause without the need to tidy things up you could have let Killmonger reign longer and T'Challa build up to take back the throne. Seeing the ramifications of what happens if those weapons got out.

 

[Dwayne_Taylor]

I agree that Ryan Coogler ruined Black Panther by making Killmonger a better hero for black people than T'Challa.

That’s why the general audience walked away quoting Killmonger lines, and didn’t care if T’Challa was recast after Chadwick passed.

The character himself was never made into the center of his own story.

 

[O.T.I.S.]

Killmonger was right.

I wore a “Killmonger was right” T shirt last time I was at Disney. A lot of people agreed even CACs.

He was right

 

[Canon]

he would kill that bytch again and yall mamas boys would clutch your pearls again