Like every news organisation in town Barbados Free Press received a news release from the mysterious anonymous ‘Black Empowerment Association’ calling for a clean-up of the Bussa Emancipation Statue on Sunday, September 2, 2012 at 7am.
Nope, I didn’t go. We (she and me) almost intended to, but we were kind of hung over.
Okay, I lie. Never intended to go. Got the press release on Saturday afternoon at 1:17pm. I never got up on Sunday until 1pm. I had a great time on Saturday night. Must ‘ave.
Looking in the news media, don’t see any coverage or photos of the called-for clean-up of Bussa. Nope. Not a word, not a photo.
Checked the emails: nothing from the ‘Black Empowerment Association’. No emails, no photos of the clean-up.
I’d wager a week’s beer money that nobody showed, and that the ‘Black Empowerment Association’ is some lone anonymous guy on the internet. We get twenty emails a week like this.
But ya know what?
At least one blog published the press release just like the ‘Black Empowerment Association’ was some real organisation with a real spokesperson, a membership, an address and a phone number. They called the article “Bussa Outrage Clean-up Project”
What a joke!
The ‘press release’ came from ‘Matt’ (no last name) at a gmail address. That’s it! Now it’s been picked up by the secondary internet news channels just like it is a real story. Go ahead, google search “Black Empowerment Association Bussa” and you’ll see have I mean.
I’m going to print the press release in full here so our readers can further tune their bullshit meters.
At BFP we try to sort the legitimate from the fake. Sometimes we fail and when we do we apologise and learn. But so far we’ve never to our knowledge presented our readers with such obvious fakery made up bullshit as this prime example. Enjoy…
Here is the nonsense that others printed as real…
BLACK EMPOWERMENT ASSOCIATION
empower1887@gmail.com
Saturday, September 1, 2012 1:19 PM
Writing on behalf of the group BLACK ENPOWERMENT ASSOCIATION we are inviting the media to attend “Bussa Outrage clean up –project”. As a group that has at its core socio-political and spiritual empowerment of African people it is one of the first community projects we will be embarking.
As a symbol of us breaking the chains of slavery at Emancipation it is shameful how little it has been taken care of. A mere 5 weeks ago it was Emancipation day in Barbados and the area is overgrown with weeds, overrun with snails and debris. The words on the sign are completely illegible in some places and missing all together in other places. What is also an issue is the access to the statue, which is an obstacle course of dodging vehicles just to end up in knee high grass and illegible signage.
It was an embarrassment to us and should be for all of Barbados that our guest, Toyin Agbetu, who is not only a tourist (on his honeymoon), but a British African social rights activist and founder of the Pan-African group Ligali had to see our Emmancipation statue is such condition Barbados ought to be ashamed after recently becoming a world heritage site that this is how we present one of our “National heroes”
Therefore on Sunday, September 2nd, 2012, at 7am, we the BLACK EMPOWERMENT ASSOCIATION will be cleaning the roundabout that houses the BUSSA statue.
Maat
Well get on with it. When your mother’s grave is buried in weeds do you expect others to clean it… If you it will soon look like the Bussa statue and no fault of his!
Wonder what people would say if an association calling itself The White Businesspersons Association started up? Or better yet, the White Empowerment Association? Its a thought geared to make one go “Hmmmmmm”.
We drove past Bussa yesterday & there were several people there taking photos & clearing so some people went.
Hi Breadfruit,
That’s good to hear. What time was that? I drove by at 8:20am and didn’t see anyone.
Robert
Was much later than that, about 10.30 – 11 I would think
An offtopic comment, you can delete if it offends.
“Pro-settler vandals attack monastery near Jerusalem”
Vandals set fire to the doors of a Christian monastery near Jerusalem on Tuesday and daubed pro-settler graffiti on its walls………..
The name of the unauthorized Migron settlement, which was cleared following a court order on Sunday, was scrawled on the well known Latrun Monastery, alongside the words “Jesus is a monkey”, ……….
http://news.yahoo.com/pro-settler-graffiti-found-torched-monastery-door-051921634.html
WWTTOF: Probably a false flag operation by Muslims. Makes sense when you think about it.
Fales wrote “WWTTOF : “Probably a false flag operation by Muslims. Makes sense when you think about it.”
Well then, I guess the guy in this video must have really been a Muslim in disguise as well, just trying to make the settlers look bad in front of a foreign film crew.
And the priests who molest little boys?
“we killed jesus and we are proud of it”
Straight from the Horse’s mouth.