FROM NOTHING

Greetings Denizens of The Empire. It's Jabari here! Welcome to The Empire From Nothing community! Growing up, I've always had a keen interest in art, history, and technology. As I got older, I began to notice an utter lack of African representation in these areas. We all grew up thinking that Africa was nothing more than a land stricken with poverty, corruption, violence, primitive tribes, disease, and wild animals. This is coupled with the fact that the only African history that we are taught in our schools focuses on topics like colonialism and slavery. This makes for not only a negative world image of blacks compared to other races, but the personal self-image of black people  as well.
 
Europeans and other peoples around the world grow up learning and knowing of many great empires, discoveries, and technologies that their people have accomplished. They see their knights in shining armor in movies like Lord of the Rings and TV shows like Game of Thrones. Comparitively, on the rare occasions when Africa is actually represented in any sort of historical media, it is usually restricted to portrayals of Egypt which is almost universally disassociated from black Africa by whites and hyperfocused by blacks. Or the Zulu who serve as an erroneous posterchild as "The Best" that black Africa has to offer, a relatively primitive image of Africans as hoards of men wearing animal furs and thrusting short spears, ignoring the complex civilizations and city-building peoples of places like Kongo, Benin, Mali, and Aksum.
 
My intent with my content is to change these negative views and ignored/unknown aspects of African history and culture and show the world what truly existed on the continent prior to the Trans - Atlantic Slave Trade. My ultimate goal in life is to found a media company that focues exclusively on creating  and promoting African content such as animations, shows, video games, and movies that depict African civilizations in a historical context in the same manner of elegance and beauty as every other world culture. I'm not here to demonize other people or cultures, nor am I here to prove that African history is somehow "better" than anyone else's. I detest pseudo - historians who spread toxicity and try to steal the culture of other people all the while playing the blame game on the white man. My only intent is to show my fellow blacks (and the world) that there is more to our history than just slavery, poverty and disease, and that we should all come together and strive to do our part in accomplishing equal representation of our history into mainstream media, culture, and education curriculum.
 
Flooding our media with predominantly negative things such as slavery does not paint a good image of African history nor does it instill any sense of pride in where we come from. Replacing white characters with black people does nothing more than imply that we have no stories of our own worthy of telling. With the power of art, design, and education, I strive to undue the deeply ingrained views and perspectives of African people that were brainwashed into the minds of the general population over the past few centuries, and sadly still linger to present day in varying capacities. This community can collectively build awareness, consciousness, and interest in African history by creating and promoting media that emphasizes this underrepresented area of human history. Welcome to THE EMPIRE!​
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