Physical Slavery Might Not Be Around But Mental Slavery Is

That’s right. The Jim Crow slave era where black people were lynched for the fun of it may be long gone, but the mental aspects of it still reign supreme in America’s national psyche. You know, America the supposed land of the free.

When a black man or black woman can’t affirm his/her business selling price without being shamed and singled out for public ridicule, you know slavery is still very much around–in the mental sense.

Defining Slave Mentality And Its Effects

Talking about mental slavery/slave mentality, we’ve come across various definitions attempting to bind and define the term on the bases of ONE race. Even definitions like the one in this article that seeks to give the term a more balanced meaning also end up being ‘restrictive’ and bias towards a specific race. In short, according to the said article (which, incidentally, was created by a black woman), slave mentality means and we quote,

“Is one of feeling inferior or of feeling lost without hope, a feeling that we do not have the power to significantly alter our own circumstances. Another sad symptom of having a slave mentality is believing that White people are superior, have all the answers, and are empowered by GOD.”

Looking at the underlying theme of the above definition, it’s easy to see the direction the author’s definitive view hinges. Since the white man in America never went through the diabolical act of slavery, her definition somehow implies that slave mentality is exclusively inherent in the thinking faculties of black people, even when she said she doesn’t intend it to mean that way. But, that is what her definition conveys.

Again, at the bolded, let’s just give the author the benefit of the doubt and assume she was referring to people who see themselves as lords over others, still, her inability to clearly hit the point rather than trying not to offend a specific race further shows the weakness in her definition and argument down the line, especially when she started blaming black people for their own misfortunes.

However, we do agree, black people have a fair share of the blame, but let’s get one thing straight. Slave mentality is not an exclusive problem of black people, nor is it inherent in their thinking. Really, the general population at large operates with a slave mentality. Slave mentality isn’t exclusive to one race.

Black people didn’t create the racial divide that America is shamelessly known for today. It wasn’t black people that rigged the educational system, going through the backdoor to get their children into elite colleges while employing all sorts of hindrances to deter black people from entry.

It certainly wasn’t black people that racialized the justice system where a white person is given a weak sentence for the same crime committed by a black man that would most likely get him a life sentence or the death penalty. The machinations employed by this sick and twisted system was brought to you in part by the descendants of the Jim Crow’s slave masters from the real slave era–white men who think their culture is superior, their religion is superior, and their wealth is superior. In their mind, they are superior human beings. We can go on and on.

So, when people try to argue and exonerate “the white man” in view of the harsh social, economic and political crisis black people all over the world are facing today, it’s like trying to acquit the Devil of being the father of lies, just because others are telling lies.

If slavery wasn’t instituted in the first place, nurtured and continuously perpetuated in a modernized form, majority of the myriad problems befalling Africans today would never have happened, and many black people today would not be seeing things nor living with a slave mentality. The evidence is overwhelming. So what is the reality?

The reality is slavery is still taking place, except for the fact that it’s not “physical.” The shackles and chains around our hands and feet are gone, but the shackles and chains on peoples’ minds are still present. That is why a black entrepreneur gets shamed for the price tag on his/her goods and services. When people of different races outside of just the Caucasian race see black people as the deplorables of society, it is hard for people to grasp why they should take a black business seriously. It’s no wonder price shaming black businesses for charging higher rates has become a common practice but when it is done by black people, it definitely shows a slave mentality on our part. You ask why? Well, because it highlights the low value we see in ourselves and the high value we assign to white businesses and their products and services.

Yes, Black People Are Guilty of Slave Mentality And It’s Time To Snap Out Of It

When you see yourself as not good enough and feel that the odds are against you because you’re black, and so you refuse to compete and settle for less, you have a slave mentality.

When you feel and encourage the warp belief that the best thing blacks are good at is becoming a rapper/singer, basketball player, football player, etc, you have a slave mentality.

When you avoid reading books and happily engage in anti-intellectualism, you are suffering from slave mentality.

When you feel that the only way your art can get popular is to seek out a review from a white-owned establishment before your art can be noticed, you have a chronic case of slave mentality.

If you are always down with patronizing white-owned businesses and services, and hardly consider black-owned businesses and services, you have a slave mentality.

Slave mentality is a general problem that affects everyone in the human race. It is not an exclusive defect of one race or another. If black people want others to treat them with respect and equality, black people must first start by treating themselves with respect and dignity. We shouldn’t do it for any kind of approval from anyone else, but we must do it because we value ourselves as black people. We must stop price shaming fellow black entrepreneurs and make all effort to patronize their hustle, if we can afford to. That brings us to the interesting topic of price shaming.

What Is Price Shaming?

Simply put, “Price shaming is the act of shaming a business for charging a price that is perceived to be “high.”

One of the hallmarks of a free capitalist economy is the ability of business owners to determine prices. America is a symbol of the free enterprise economic model in which you have the right to set the price for your goods and services offered to the public. Unfortunately, people who are anti-black racists and black people with low self-esteem who walk around purposefully ignorant of their slave mentality, believe they have the right to tell you what price you should sell your goods and services.

As it were with children, people with problems of mental slavery waste no time in throwing the shaming admonition phrase “shame on you” for charging what they termed to be an excessive price. Sadly, many people consider and accept shaming as a general way of modifying behavior. But does shaming really change one’s behavior?

Considering that shaming in and of itself is different from the concept of guilt, it does not really alter the psychology of human behavior, especially for adults in the legitimate course of business practice. Rather, shaming fuels low self-esteem and social withdrawal, it doesn’t in any way motivate pro-social behaviors.

So, when people with a slave mentality price shame black businesses for charging “too high,” they do so in a bid to humiliate black entrepreneurs. It is a calculated attempt to make black people feel inferior and less valued because the reality is that’s how they see themselves.

Like Jesus and the Pharisees, Like Black Entrepreneurs and People with a Slave Mentality

The Holy Bible may look so common to many of us. Still, it’s such a mysteriously powerful book that has successfully preempted and reaffirmed human behavior in all aspect.

In the Holy gospel, according to St. Luke, Jesus was subjected to entertain an illogical, horrible and mentally sick behavioral show of foolishness from the Pharisees.

The Lord was forced to reply to this show of mental display by the Pharisees when He said in Luke 7:33-34,

“33 For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ 34 The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a [a]winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’

The experience of John the Baptist and Jesus in the hands of the crazy Pharisees is strikingly similar to what black people (and some other businesses) are facing today in America.

John came eating no bread and drinking no wine, and they labeled him possessed with a demon. Then Jesus came eating and turning water to wine, and they shamed him, calling him an alcoholic and a terrible guzzler.

Black entrepreneurs who charge lower prices for the goods or services they offer are shamed for charging too low, but when they charge higher prices, they’re shamed for that as well. You’re damned if you, damned if you don’t. But should we be surprised about shaming? No, not really. It has a long-running history.

The history of shaming of black people (white people inclusive) and all that they represent dates back to colonial and slave-era America. From Public stocks to public ridicule, shaming was a grand punishment in those days, until 1787, when Benjamin Rush, the man who founded shaming described it as “a punishment that is worse than death,” which pave the way for its reevaluation.

However, while the physical practice of shaming has ceased, its mental practice is still very much in vogue today, and we see it in how people in general are price shaming black entrepreneurs.

Take it or leave it, shaming is one of the diabolic tools narcissists’ employed to enforce their warped beliefs and control their perceived targets. Narcissists are quick to identify and exaggerate faults while parading themselves as “perfectionists.” They know how to retell someone else’s story while adding their own flare of shame to it. Narcissists like to break people’s confidence, use people’s religious belief to make them feel guilty and comparing accomplishments. If they were in Jesus’ time as the Pharisees, why should we be surprised by their presence in the 21st century as people with a slave mentality?

Of course, our modern economic and political system of free enterprise presupposes that such a blatant act of shaming should be a thing of the past. Unfortunately, black entrepreneurs and many other businesses owned by black and white people are shamed for charging “too high” and are told that they should lower their prices. They are compared to other businesses that will charge a lower rate. This tells black companies that they shouldn’t charge what they are worth.

Shaming tactics are employed to get the business to lower their price(s). We already see this in the prescription drug business where price shaming is increasingly gaining relevancy in legislation. If it is already happening to a few big white-owned corporations, imagine what the situation would be like for small businesses owned by black entrepreneurs. This calls for vigilance, and we must be ready to fight off the blissful ignoramuses with a slave mentality.

Top 3 Reasons Black Businesses Aren’t Taken Seriously

There are a myriad of reasons why black businesses are less valued and not taken seriously as businesses operated by people of another race. Some of these reasons include but are not limited to:

Lack Of Wealth And Resources

Any business that has no reliable access to finance is like someone with one leg on a landmine just waiting to explode. It takes wealth to create more wealth and acquire critical resources that will help to sustain the business life. Years of systematic racial oppression suffered by black people and carried over to the current modern times of covert racism has denied black people the crucial resources that have helped the most entrepreneurially accomplished races to succeed.

Racial segregation, employer discrimination, low levels of income, poor education and lack of resources are some of the disadvantages black people are experiencing in 21st century America. This makes it difficult for them to secure and create the necessary wealth that would have to make their business a success.

For instance, in April 2002, a study conducted by Congress found that “Majority of banks largely avoids African-American neighborhoods, including those with above-average income.” This forced many black people to rely on costly and abusive lenders. If not that, they’re relying on their own income and credit cards.

Besides, the wealth gap between white and black families is just too wide that it’s almost hopeless for blacks to cope in business activities. For instance, while the wealth rating for an average white family stands at $113,000 in 2009, the wealth rating for an average black family stands at $5,700. This makes black-owned businesses to be very unattractive and extremely difficult for them to secure crucial loans. In short, black businesses are already missing out from the recent $2.2 trillion COVID-19 stimulus package allocated by Congress.

Lack Of Good Customer Service

Let’s face it; some black entrepreneurs are their own worst enemy. Markets are conversations and keeping your customers engaged is vital for success. Unfortunately, many black entrepreneurs perform poorly in customer service. While a lack of good customer service isn’t limited to black businesses alone, black entrepreneurs must learn the art of excellent customer service as key to customer retention and brand loyalty. We understand the there are plenty of black businesses with excellent customer service, but there are some that underperform in that category. That reflects on black business as a whole since there is already a negative stigma attached to blackness. We love black business and will continue to occupy them, but the streets talk. When the streets (we’re talking black people online and offline) lament on the poor customer service exhibited by black businesses; that speaks volumes.

Lack Of Black Support

Another reason why black businesses aren’t taken seriously by other demographics is due to the increased neglect and lack of patronage of black businesses by black people. It’s sad, but that’s the reality. Findings shows that majority of black people prefer to buy from white-owned businesses compared to black-owned businesses. If you don’t value and support the businesses run by your own race, how can you expect others to do so?

Black Entrepreneurs And Creatives Shouldn’t Have To Work For Free

When people with slave mentality price shame black entrepreneurs, they’re virtually saying that you should work for free. It makes no sense to degrade your craft and undervalue your worth.

Many of the same people who slam you for charging higher prices for what you believe you are worth are the same people that will quickly wrap your craft for being uncertain, inferior, unproductive, poor and wretched. Some organizations are specialists in asking people to work for them free in return for exposure. Black entrepreneurs and creatives should never work for free, especially when you cannot predict the future.

Exposure doesn’t guarantee a 100% route to revenue in the future. It doesn’t guarantee you something that has more value than money. So, even if Oprah calls, never agree to market your craft for free so long as you’re surrounded by modern Pharisees whom you can never satisfy. We advise that you read this article and understand better why you should never work for free. Add value to your creative excellence and damn the price shaming tactics of the defeatists with their slave mentality.

The Slave Mentality Needs To Stop With The Consumer And The Business

It’s about time businesses and individuals—whether black or white or any other color—stand up against price shaming because it’s a product of slave mentality.

As stated earlier, slave mentality isn’t a problem exclusive to black people, and indeed, not to white people alone. It is a condition that affects people of all races but in different ways and from a different viewpoint.

If you can’t stand the price tag on a black-owned business that charges a premium rate for quality products and services, simply move on. If you can’t afford the products and services, there is no need to be embarrassed. There is also no need to try to embarrass the business owner. No one is mandating you to buy at the prices presented to you. If you can’t afford to pay the price, then just swallow your pride and go somewhere else. Tons of businesses offer products and services for lower rates. It’s about time we end the slave mentality itch in the business and consumer industry. When you feel that black people don’t have the right to set their own price, it goes to show you have a colonial mentality.

When you as a black man or black woman prefer to buy from a white-owned business even when there is a black-owned business nearest to you with a competitive price and with better quality, that implies you have a slave or colonial mentality.

Black people have to stop living with feelings of inferiority complex, and we have to stop looking at other black people as inferior. We shouldn’t feel the need to spend a lot of money at white businesses and then question why spending that same amount (or more) in a black business that charges appropriately for a quality product/service. Black people value name-brand products created by white people but don’t see why they should support a black business that has a better product. Black people have to stop seeking white validation.

If White Entrepreneurs Can Charge Premium Rates, Then Black Entrepreneurs Can Too

Now, here is another thing we need to get straight. Price isn’t the ultimate function of value; price is predominantly a function of your ideology, perception and positioning. You heard that right.

You can be one big white or black-owned business, charge premium prices and end up delivering crap, or you can charge really low or nothing and still deliver crap. Your entrepreneurability to deliver inferior products/services is not dependent on the total amount they pay you, just as your business ability to deliver quality and world-class solutions doesn’t depend on the amount you charge.

In other words, there is no one perfect price. The perfect rate is the one that makes YOU feel completely GRATIFIED.

So, black entrepreneurs must never allow anyone to shame them for the price they set over their goods and services. No single race or group of people has a pricing monopoly. If white businesses can charge premium rates, and no one is price shaming them for it, black entrepreneurs’ can also charge premium rates and should feel happy about it. Besides, the white man isn’t a two-headed being, same with the black man, so no one should get humiliated for the rates they charge—whether high or low.

As a black entrepreneur, you can charge more for your products or services if you know how to position differently, add tiers (having more than one product choice) and add value, and increase the price to the proportion of the value you are offering.

Learn more about the art of pricing and master the techniques that will enable you to charge more for more gain without losing sight of your clients/customers.

Lastly, you mustn’t charge below your worth. Underpricing your value is a red flag that sends the wrong signal. If you intend to succeed as a black entrepreneur in the midst of a crooked and perverted nation full of people with a slave mentality, you must learn to act the most righteous and disciplined way.  There is no shortcut to a success that will last.