Priest Discusses Oppression

All cases of oppression in history are self-inflicted, a reverend old an audience of about 50 in Sever Hall last night at a speech sponsored by the Black students Association.

"All oppression that we can document from any time on earth has all been self-induced," Rev. James L. Bevel, founder and chair of the Declaration of Independence Co-signers' Convention, said in a speech last night.

Bevel began his hour-long talk by defining oppression.

He attributed its occurrence to instances when "you give authority to another person's erroneous concepts and disrespect the truth that you already know."

Most people remain oppressed because they don't look for the root of oppression within themselves, Bevel said.

"The reason most people are not free is because they assume the oppression comes from a source other than themselves," Bevel said.

Bevel drew a triangle on the blackboard in the Sever Hall classroom in which he spoke, splitting it in half with a wavy line.

The top half, Bevel wrote, is arrogance; the bottom half is cowardice.

"We have the [authority] to take this out," Bevel said, pointing to the cowardice. "We found out if you take out half the elements, the system goes down."

The Slavery Question

One audience member asked Bevel why he didn't consider European enslavement of Africans to be oppression on the part of the Europeans.

In response, Bevel asked the audience member where she had heard that.

Most of the audience responded that their relatives had told them, or that they'd read that account in history books.

Bevel said that there was a difference between "memory" and "history."

"When you want to get into history, you're dealing with [cause and effect]," Bevel said. "When you get into memory, you're getting into [incidence]."

Bevel then drew a triangle on the board and circled the apex.

He said that he, a minister, as a "Baptist pimp" represented the top of the triangle he had described, and that the "women in my choir" were at the triangle's base.

Bevel then compared this triangle to the situation in Africa.

He said African chieftains were at the apex of the triangle, and they wanted the women at the base of the triangle.

But their competition, Bevel said, was the other young men.

"So what do you think he did? He sent the young men...and killed them," Bevel said. "That's how we got here."

"You've got to take the burden of your oppression and put it where it belongs," Bevel said.