I know I have been one of the key drivers of the narrative that the African is stupid. Many self-hating low-IQed baboons have latched on this to make endless deprecating statements about themselves and Black people in general. Statements like "Africans need another 1,000 years to evolve’; ‘Africa is doomed’; ‘Sisi Waafrika ni kama tulirogwa’ and such kind of nonsense.
The fact is the Black man is the most talented of the various human ‘races’. This is self-evident in various fields of human endeavour, from sports, music and even science.
But there is a snag. I think it’s Michellin or some tyre company that said, power without control is nothing.
The average African is just that; unrealised power without control. Many of us are lazy, and focus on the base things of life - sex, booze, food. After that we just go to sleep. We don’t utilise our intelligence to the full.
A few African communities have broken out of this indolent lifestyle. These basically are the traditionally agricultural bantus like the Igbo, the Gikuyu, the Tutsi, the Chagaa, the Kisii etc etc - in the nations they occupy, you will find that they are at the top of the economic ladder.
Africa’s genetic profile makes the staement ‘the African is stupid’ redundant. The fact is, Africa is the most genetically diverse continent in the world. It may shock many of you, but the average Gikuyu is genetically closer to an Italian than to a Luo! The Bushman is genetically closer to the Japanese than he is to a pygmy from the Congo forest. To tag all these diverse communities with a ‘low IQ, tumerogwa and need 1,000 more years to evole’ tag is baboonishly stupid.
What we need on this continent is not an increase in IQ points. What we need is a cultural revolution among many of our communities. More than anything else we must jumpstart some of these ‘lazy’ communities to join the modern economy. This we can do by requiring them to use their innate/inherent intelligence not to complain and device new ways of getting food aid but to become entrepreneurs. We must crush those cultures that require people to conform to archaic lifestyles like early child marriages, female circumcision, men not working (go to ‘marginalised’ Turkana and you will find its the women and children ALONE who work) etc etc. In the 19th century, the British did this by imposing a hut tax.
Imagine the boost to the economy if all the pastolarists roaming around cattle-rustling engaged in more constructive cattle farming, as the coastals took to farming and commercial fishing (it never ceases to amaze me that the sukuma wiki eaten in Mombasa comes from Nyandarwa, 700 kilometres away). Imagine the boost to the economy if Turkana men stopped spending all their days basking and instead exploited fully the potential of Lake Turkana. Suddenly things would look a lot more sunnier, and this talk of low IQs would just go away.
Look at the Somalis and the Kambas. Both come from arid areas but if you go to any town in Kenya you will find them thriving in business. Incredibly resilient and innovative people (including the Mwende kumapreneurs of Paipu). When was the last time you met a Turkana or a Miji Kenda selling anything? Like, NEVER? WHY?
To conclude, Africans are not inherently stupid. But due to our cultures and climate, many of us are inclined to be lazy. This malaise often runs in communities. If we change that, we will reap the benefits of our superior (in general) genetics.
Until then, we shall be called stupid when in fact we are not.