What About "The Okoampa-Ahoofe Articles"?

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

I am not in the extraneous habit of writing rejoinders; I prefer to use my leisure moments in crafting essays and articles of moment for my readers. Besides, I tend to believe that rejoinders are the domain of rabid reactionaries who have nothing either original or meaningful to offer critical readers and thinkers. I prefer to discuss real issues, both pleasant and unpleasant that need discussing or sooner than later they erroneously come to be deemed as truths and truisms by the less critical and pliable. I also let others worry about the "flamboyance" with which I craft and disseminate my message.

That is not, in any way, to suggest that I allow others to decide for me the style in which I ought to write; not at all! I am a Literary Journalist with intellectual and critically thinking readers as my primary audience, and that is my choice; I don't presume to compell anybody to read my postings. You either like them or you don't. And that is perfectly fine with me, because I didn't even know that there existed anybody with your particular kind of name, jaundiced personality and identity out there.

Also, whether I am 49 years old or 69 is none of anybody's business! What is your business is whether you choose to read my articles or ignore them; which is also none of my "frigging" business because in a democratic culture, your right not to read my articles is as important as my right not to be dictated to by your ignorance, arrogance and the quirks of your ilk!

Now, on the question of feedback: I already have established a respectable covey of critical thinkers and enlightened peers, friends and associates with whom I share ideas and opinions, so I really have no need to waste my time reading gibberish authored by anonymous turd-spewing brats with such uncouth pseudonyms as "Fuck You!" and quizzical impersonators of distinguished Ghanaians who would rather be strategizing about the next progressive step of where our beloved nation ought to be headed than slinging mud with grubs.

Then also, whether I am politically intolerant or not is my democratic right, as long as I am not in the ungodly business of coercing you to think and/or believe in the same things that I do. What business has the fact of Ghana's being "a democracy and not an autocracy" got to do with me, poor bloke? Likewise, what I choose to remember about Ghana or deem authentic and valid about the same is none of your business, including your selective amnesia and anti-Akan Trokosi Nationalist vitriol.

And just what is "responsible journalism," poor soul? Is it what you decide it is or what those no-name "Fuck You!" pseudonymous bastards decide it is? Come on, you son-of-a-roach, bring yourself up into the 2010s; I was always here before you and your kind came into existence and of age. A cowardly Ghanaian, indeed! Step closer to me and see whether you'd escape with your stiff neck intact. I wonder what sort of "Communication Design II" you study at KNUST. Not one that would arouse my envy, I am quite certain.

You know my 89-year-old Aunt Mary Awo Baaduaa Sintim was among the Class of '52 Atubam Group of Kumasi Science and Technology Pioneers? You are coming to this game rather too late. That's how I know how cognitively lethargic you are. I hope I have cleared your "cobwebby" mind a bit.

Sayonara, little boy! Say "Hi!" to your Mama for me. We used to pet in the hedges near the entrance to KNUST, where the giant-sized Akan royal stool stands. Was Mr. Nkrumah an ethnic supremacist for having this sculpture mounted on the campus of an institution named for him? "De-Akanization of Ghana," indeed!

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Department of English

Nassau Community College of SUNY

Garden City, New York

Sept. 6, 2013

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum

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