It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
As COVID-19 spread around the world in early 2020, hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), an anti-malaria drug touted as a miracle cure by the US president Donald Trump, triggered a global, polarized debate with significant geopolitical impacts.
The debate around HCQ in the United States was widely covered in international English-language media, but the controversy swirling around the same drug in Brazil and India — two countries where partisanship is equally as rife — has received less attention.
The countries deployed drastically different responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. India declared a national lockdown on March 25, while Brazil never instituted one. In both countries, however, the HCQ debate quickly became a useful rhetorical lever to push nationalist positions. Even as HCQ's efficacy remained unproven, its use was aggressively touted by Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi.
HCQ has now been removed by the US Federal Drug Administration's list of drugs approved for use against COVID-19, yet both India and Brazil continue to recommend its use as a treatment.
Brazil and India have plenty in common. Both are middle-income economies and large democracies that have elected far-right nationalist leaders in the past decade. Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have galvanized support around Hindu-nationalist sentiment in an attempt to raise India’s profile as an international powerhouse. Brazil elected Bolsonaro president in 2018 on a platform that blended tough-on-crime-and-corruption rhetoric with hardline cultural conservatism and ultra-liberal economic policy that promised sweeping labor and environmental deregulation.
India, the world's largest manufacturer of HCQ, was in a unique position to exploit the opening provided by Trump and his supporters’ championing of the drug. The Indian government had initially banned the exportation of HCQ, then reversed the ban and began supplying the drug on a large scale to the US, Brazil, Morocco, and other countries.
In Brazil — a modest manufacturer of the drug in comparison to India — Bolsanaro ordered an Armed Forces’ pharmaceutical lab to boost its production of HCQ three days after Trump first called the drug a “game-changer.” By mid-April, the lab had increased its output of the drug a hundredfold.
Bolsonaro began aggressively promoting HCQ as a miracle cure, causing the resignation of two health ministers between April and May. In April, Twitter deleted a video post by Bolsonaro in which he defends the drug's use at a political rally. Twitter asserted that the tweet violated the platform’s rules, marking the first time the company deleted a post by a Brazilian head of state. In May, Bolsonaro said in one of his weekly live broadcasts on social media that “if you’re right-wing, you take chloroquine; if you’re left-wing, you take Tubaína” (Tubaína is a soft-drink popular in some Brazilian regions).
Bolsonaro, Modi, and Trump all employ conspiracy narratives and seek enemies or traitors in order to energize their supporters. In both India and Brazil, as in the US, these narratives hinge on unproven claims of scientific evidence that HCQ is effective against COVID-19. The imagined enemy in these narratives is the World Health Organization (WHO) and China, which are accused of suppressing this information in collusion with social media companies and the media. The beneficiaries of this alleged scheme include big pharmaceutical companies, who are said to be poised to produce a new treatment that is sure to be both expensive and lucrative.
The idea that there’s a miracle cure for a disease that has killed over 400,000 people, and that a few powerful but morally dubious elements are preventing people from accessing it, allows these leaders to them cast themselves in the role of saviors fighting against an evil system. Brazil’s selective science
A favorite tactic of Bolsonaro’s supporters is amplifying the opinions of the handful of scientists and doctors who defend the early administration of hydroxychloroquine to COVID-19 patients.
When Exame, a well-established Brazilian business magazine, reported on a study conducted by a private hospital network that allegedly “cured 300 COVID-19 patients with hydroxychloroquine,” the article was shared extensively on social media in right-wing circles. According to the Exame story, Brazilian hospital Prevent Senior administered HCQ to 500 COVID-19 patients, of whom 300 recovered from the disease.
Similarly to the discredited French study that sparked the HCQ debate in the first place, the Prevent Senior trial was neither randomized nor double-blind, the gold standard for clinical drug trials. Many experts pointed to problems with the study’s sample.
Two weeks later, Brazil’s National Ethics Board in Medical Research ordered the suspension of the study, on the grounds that Prevent Senior had not obtained prior authorization to begin the research. Its directors will be investigated by the board for misconduct.
None of that prevented Carla Zambelli, one of Bolsonaro’s closest allies in Congress, from promoting the study on Twitter and on Facebook, where the post was shared over 6,800 times.
Social media posts by Brazilian federal deputy and member of Congress Carla Zambelli, promoting an article highlighting a discredited research study on the efficacy of HCQ in treating COVID-19. The post attracted hundreds of comments and was shared thousands of times on both platforms.
An English-language text detailing the study was also published after the suspension on Medicine Uncensored, a portal frequently mentioned by supporters of Trump and Bolsonaro in Brazil and the United States.
Other favored targets of Bolsonaro supporters are medical studies concluding that HCQ is ineffective or unsafe for treating COVID-19. On social media, death threats were leveled at the authors of a study conducted in Manaus, one of the cities hardest hit by the pandemic, which compared the effects of different dosages of HCQ on patients with severe symptoms. After the authors published a preliminary finding that HCQ could be lethal in severely ill patients on the online portal medRxiv, the New York Times picked up the story, which drew widespread attention to the study in Brazil. Bolsonaro supporters began digging through the researchers’ social media profiles, allegedly finding evidence showing the researchers’ support for leftist politicians.
On an April 16 Facebook post by federal deputy and Bolsonaro ally Bia Kicis criticizing the study, many of the commenters call for one of the researchers to be arrested or killed for “murdering people on purpose in order to disprove HCQ.” The post has been shared over 29,000 times.
A photo of one of the researchers of the Manaus medical study is shown in this Facebook post by Bolsonaro ally Bia Kicis. Many commenting on the post called for the researcher to be arrested or killed.
Conexão Política, a pro-Bolsonaro website, added fuel to the fire when it published a story with screenshots and links to the researchers’ social media profiles. According to the story: “Everything seems to suggest that the research was financed by federal funds allocated by leftist senators, and it was also known by the former Minister of Health Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who at a press conference on Wednesday (April 15) cited the clinical trial by political militants of Manaus, without criticizing or denouncing the irresponsibility of leftist activist researchers.” India’s diplomatic lever
In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has trumpeted India’s massive exportation of HCQ as one of its great achievements. The BJP sees India’s HCQ production as an opportunity to develop soft power as well as strengthen its position in relation to its regional rival China.
In early April, Trump praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his leadership in the export of HCQ in a tweet and a press conference. On the same day, Bolsonaro sent Modi a letter thanking his Indian counterpart for resuming HCQ exports. Pro-BJP media and Hindu nationalist social media spaces glorified Bolsanaro’s message, which they viewed as proof of India's success in strengthening diplomatic relations between the two countries, and noted the Brazilian president’s reference to the Hindu god Hanuman.
The idea that India is leading the charge against COVID-19 through its production of HCQ has resonated strongly among BJP and Modi supporters, some of whom have exploited existing tensions with China and Pakistan to further exalt India as a COVID-19 leader. One Facebook post asks whether India should make supplying Pakistan with the drug conditional. Other posts on pro-Modi Facebook groups promote the characterization of China as an aggressor who infected the world with COVID-19 and posted graphics bearing statements such as “China sent the virus to the world…My India sent medicine to the world. Proud to be an Indian.”
Popular social media posts exploiting tensions between India and Pakistan and India and China. The WHO and China: perfect enemies
A major element of the right-wing discourse around HCQ in both Brazil and India is antagonism toward the WHO, though on this score Bolsonaro and Modi diverge in terms of approach. Bolsonaro has long disdained multilateralism, while Modi holds a more favorable, if opportunistic view, believing that multilateralism could help advance India’s national interests.
In both countries, however, a series of recent missteps by the WHO gave a boost to each leader’s agenda.
In late May, after a highly publicized study published in the prestigious Lancet medical journal concluded that HCQ increased the risk of death and cardiac complications in COVID patients, the WHO temporarily suspended trials of the drug. Ultimately, the study was retracted by its lead author, and the WHO rescinded the suspension of the clinical trials.
The WHO’s indecision, combined with the growing skirmishes at the China-India border and a more global narrative that seeks to blame China for the pandemic, triggered a surge of Indian right-wing discourse against the organization.
The day after the WHO announced the suspension, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) stated that India would continue testing HCQ in combined trials. BJP supporters applauded the ICMR’s decision, calling the WHO “incompetent” and trotting out the claim that the organization was controlled by China and big pharmaceutical companies who want to “diminish India’s global impact and economy.”
After the WHO reversed its decision, Modi supporters celebrated the organization's “caving in” to India, which they viewed as a strike against China’s attempts to diminish India’s importance in the international market.
Popular social media posts by a journalist from a pro-government news outlet and a pro-Modi Facebook group touting India's HCQ production and promoting the idea of COVID-19 as “made in China” virus.
A similar dynamic played out in Brazil. Immediately after the May 15 resignation of Nelson Taich as health minister — the second to resign since the WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic — his replacement, General Eduardo Pazuello, signed a protocol recommending that Brazilian doctors use HCQ for COVID-19 patients.
Brazil's government didn't change its stance after the Lancet study appeared, and when the study was eventually retracted and the WHO apologized for having suspended solidarity trials based on it, Bolsonaristas gloated that their hostility toward the WHO was justified.
Pro-Bolsonaro social media pages and legislators have claimed that denying HCQ to COVID-19 patients is a “crime against humanity,” an assertion also made in April by US doctor Vladimir Zelenko in an interview with former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon. Dr. Zelenko rose from obscure general practitioner to right-wing media stardom in the US for trumpeting the use of the hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin and zinc sulfate against COVID-19. He is being investigated by federal prosecutors in the US for falsely claiming that a hospital study of drugs he had promoted had won federal approval. Two nationalisms
While Indian opposition to China stems from regional disputes and competition for global influence, in Brazil the anti-China narrative is more abstract and based on a deep ideological allegiance— some would say subservience— to the United States.
Militant anti-communism has been a staple of Brazilian right-wing politics since the 1930s, with the Bolsonaro government its most recent incarnation. Part of the current anti-communist narrative is that there is a new cold war, a global struggle between freedom— represented by the Trump’s United States— and communism— represented by China — and Brazil is simply siding with morality. This is the logic by which Bolsonaro critics, including some of Brazil’s most emblematic right-wing figures, end up being labeled as “communists” by his supporters.
The controversy surrounding hydroxychloroquine and COVID-19 is a testament to the challenge scientists face in a post-truth era. As research on effective treatments for COVID-19 continues, hydroxychloroquine stands on a precarious pedestal. It is used to advance partisan geopolitical anxieties about science and healthcare, and influences and overshadows coverage of other aspects of the pandemic.
In Brazil and India, which are experiencing a rapid decline in both democracy and public faith in the democratic process, that challenge can be particularly hard to navigate and understand.
Modi was notorious for his misrule as chief minister for the state of Gujarat, where under his tenure Muslims were targeted and killed. Bolsonaro rose up from the fringes of Brazilian Congress, where he made a career out of insulting LGBTQ+ people and praising Brazilian’s right-wing military dictatorship, which ruled from 1964 to 1985.
Both administrations have been marked by the erosion of institutions, attacks on the press, and persecution of critics. In India, religious minorities, especially Muslims, bear the brunt of that persecution, to the detriment of a multicultural and secular India enshrined in the republic's 1947 constitution. In Brazil, it is plurality of political opinion, and the social rights enshrined in the country’s progressive 1988 constitution that are most at risk.
Asteris Masouras and Alex Esenler contributed research for this story.
Miguel plunged from the ninth floor of a building while under the care of his mother’s white employer
Posted 22 June 2020 A protester holds a sign saying ‘what if it was the employer’ son?
Justice for Miguel. Image: Mídia NINJA/CC BY-NC 2.0
On June 2, Mirtes de Souza, a domestic worker at an upper-class family home in the northeastern Brazilian city of Recife, brought her 5-year-old son Miguel to her workplace. While nurseries and schools have been shut in Recife since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Mirtes wasn't granted time off by her employers.T
That day, Mirtes asked her white boss to mind Miguel while she went out to walk the house dog. When she came back, she found her son on the ground floor of the building after an apparent fall. Miguel was taken to the hospital alive, but didn't survive.
CCTV images obtained by the police later showed Mirtes’ boss, Sari Côrte Real, placing Miguel into an elevator by himself, and pressing the button to one of the top floors of the building. Images then show Miguel leaving the elevator on the ninth floor where, authorities later deduced, he climbed an unprotected gallery with air-conditioners, and fell.
Côrte Real was arrested and charged with manslaughter but released after paying a 20,000 BRL bail (around 4,000 US dollars). Police says it's investigating the possibility that Miguel was pushed from the ninth floor.
In the wake of George Floyd's protests in Brazil, the case sparked outrage on social media, with many considering Miguel's death yet another example of the racism Brazil's black citizens endure.
When local media avoided releasing Sari's name and photos (social media users eventually uncovered them), Mirtes gave an interview to TV Globo that went viral:
If it was me, my face would be on the front pages, as I’ve seen happening many times on TV. My name would be on the headlines and my face would be everywhere. But hers can’t be in the media, it can’t be made public. (…) I hope that justice is served, because if it was the other way around, I think I wouldn’t even have the right to post bail. A life is gone, because of a lack of patience. To leave a child on their own, in an elevator, you can’t do that. A child that was entrusted to her. Brazil's racism
Miguel's story quickly became national news. Many have seen it as a symbol of the worst in Brazil, especially its systemic racism against black citizens.
Brazil forcibly brought around 5 million Africans to work as slaves in a period spanning 400 years — over ten times more than the United States. Brazil was also the last country in the Americas to abolish slavery (in 1888).
But Miguel's death was also a reminder of Brazil's rampant corruption and inequality, and how both have been exacerbated in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Mirtes had no choice but to keep working during the pandemic in order to provide for her family. She wasn't an exception: The first COVID-19 death registered in Rio de Janeiro, in March, was of a domestic worker who was also impeded to quarantine by her employer.
In an interview, Mirtes said that she, her mother, and her son Miguel all had tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19's virus), but their symptoms were mild.
Meanwhile, Mirtes’ employer Sari, a white woman living in one of the wealthiest areas of Recife, was a member of a traditional political family in the state of Pernambuco. Sari's husband, Sérgio Hacker, is the mayor of Tamandaré, a small town 100 km away from Recife to where Mirtes says she was frequently brought over by the family.
WE WANT JUSTICE FOR MIGUEL! In Recife, protesters make an intervention in front of the place where Miguel died, the luxury condo known as Twin Towers. 20,000 is the life of a poor black child and a mother's pain.
Miguel’s death sparked protests in the streets of Recife and on social media. The building where it happened made it even more symbolic to activists: its construction has been marred in controversy as it's located in a protected historical area.
On June 5, dozens of protesters, alongside Miguel’s family, marched towards the buildings, where Corte Real and her family lives. People laid down on the street to remember how the child died.
“I want my mother”, protesters today in Recife, in memory and asking for justice to little Miguel, age 5.
Miguel's death was also remembered in Brazil's protests against racism in the wake of the death of George Floyd in the United States and the Black Lives Matter movement.
Another case remembered at the protests was of João Pedro, a black 14-year-old killed by the police inside his own home in Rio de Janeiro on May 18.
A collective of daughters and sons of domestic workers, created in March to ask for social isolation rights for their parents, published a note reminding that what happened to Miguel could have happened to any of them:
What happened with Miguel, 5 years-old, opened wide the INEQUALITY, RACISM, CLASSISM. The denied right for isolation that are mothers are facing. How many of us died in the big house? How many will have to die in the buildings until something is done?
Justin Trudeau in a federal election campaign appearance in September 2019, addressing accusations that he habitually wore blackface until at least his early thirties. The Trudeau Liberals did not lose the election and were able to form a minority government. Screencap from NBC News official YouTube channel.
The United States is going through a tough period right now. Mass demonstrations and protests against deep-rooted racism and police brutality that are met with even more racism and police brutality. An economy that has been shut down by a pandemic that has annihilated millions of jobs. An incompetent response by authorities to COVID-19 that has shut down entire cities, and is now seeing wave after relentless wave of new infections and mortality all across the country.
And, above all else, an unstable president who threatens to inflict yet more violence, chaos, and death on Americans.
Thanks to this daily cascade of grim news, some Americans friends have turned their gaze northward to my country, Canada. For many Americans, it seems, Canada is a fantasy realm of kindness and good manners, a sexy, country-size Portlandia minus the whimsically giant donuts and the Klan, or an Austin, Texas without tacos or open carry.
On June 11, after nearly two weeks of unrelenting police violence against citizens peacefully protesting the killing of George Floyd and in support of Black lives, the Daily Show released a comedy segment in which Americans pleaded with Canada to invade the US and restore order to the country. By mid-June, the hashtag #InvadeUsCanada was trending on Twitter.
“Compared to the gong show that is the United States, Canada is pretty amazing,” is the kind of thing my Americans friends typically say in these COVID-19 times.
My response?
When it comes to racism, the United States is far more progressive than Canada. At least Americans can talk about race. In Canada, thanks to our reputation as “a really nice apartment over a meth lab”, race is almost never part of our national conversation, making racism much more dangerous.
In fact, in a national dialogue dominated by a literal sock puppet, it's not unusual for Canadians to deny racism exists here. Earlier in June, as the protests spread throughout cities in the United States, a prominent media personality, writing in The National Post, one of Canada's two ailing national dailies, stated that Canada is not a racist country. After a “newsroom revolt,” the Post's opinions editor claimed that the column was the result of an editorial “miscommunication.” The story is still live on the National Post website, with a clarification note added at the top.
However, this was not the first time in just the past year that, following a newsroom revolt, a Canadian media outlet has explained away the publication of racist commentary. The problem is, racism in the media is not limited to these high-profile cases. Some commentators are wondering why journalists don't speak up more when racist columns appear in print as a matter of course.
Instances of overt racism in Canadian newsrooms are often explained away as simple mistakes. In June, when Wendy Mesley, an influential CBC media personality, admitted to using the “n-word” during an editorial discussion (as is usual in Canada, the specifics of the incident have not been made public), the excuse she gave is that she was quoting a Black interviewee.
By claiming to have been repeating one of us, she is pushing responsibility for her comments onto us, and doubling down on her racist conduct by refusing to truly own it […] Black journalists are not responsible for Wendy Mesley’s racism, and we are outraged that she is trying to use us as cover for her own choices.
The silencing of Black and minority voices in Canada is not unusual. In 2017, Desmond Cole himself was essentially forced to quit his freelancing gig at the Toronto Star, Canada's largest newspaper in terms of circulation, because of his activism about carding (random street checks by police) and other issues. As the Wendy Mesley story broke, journalists such as BuzzFeed's Scaachi Koul shared stories about how they had been blacklisted by CBC for voicing opinions or have been continually mistaken for other non-white coworkers by colleagues and managers.
Others, such as CBC reporter Angela Sterritt, reported experiencing “lateral violence” from fellow journalists. Some journalists have quit:
One. Hundred. Percent.
Codes of conduct often serve – purposefully or not – to silence marginalized journalists. https://t.co/hVMazD95NC
It's no wonder, then, that Canadian media is largely silent when it comes to covering racism and colonial violence. For instance, it took a foreign media outlet, the Guardian, to break the story that Canadian police were prepared to shoot Indigenous activists who were trying to protect traditional lands from a pipeline project.
This month, white, privileged commentators and people in positions of power have been arguing whether or not systemic racism in exists in Canada even as cruel, tragic examples of police brutality were exposed on an almost daily basis. The alleged chasing down and subsequent beating of an Indigenous man by an officer of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) is just one of several allegations of police misconduct in the far northern territory of Nunavut. In Alberta, dashcam footage was released that showed RCMP officers violently assaulting a prominent First Nations leader. In the same week, police in New Brunswick shot dead two Indigenous people.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic began in March, Canada's police forces have killed more Indigenous people than COVID-19, according to entrepreneur and writer Robert Jago.
So, as The Daily Show was encouraging Americans to share the patronizing hashtag #InvadeUsCanada against the backdrop of the Black Lives Matter demonstrations across the U.S. and Canada, racialized communities in Canada endured brutal violence, and Canadians themselves finally started to talk about and address race, and even about defunding the police.
It must be said, however, that Black journalists, activists and regular Canadian citizens have long struggled to fight for justice and to focus attention on the discrimination that Black Canadians and other people of colour experience in Canada. For example, Edmonton resident Bashir Mohamed, in his spare time, has persuaded a local school board to apologize to a Black student for racial discrimination. Mohamed has also shared his own experiences growing up Black in Edmonton and has brought to light the Alberta capital city's historical ties to the Ku Klux Klan.
Many others have worked hard to ensure Canada's Black history is not erased. In Vancouver in mid-June, Black Lives Matter activists occupied two viaducts that were all that remained of the city's plans fifty years ago to build elevated highways throughout Vancouver. The plans were foiled back then, but not before Vancouver's historic Black community of Hogan's Alley was demolished, and its residents displaced. The Hogan's Alley Society is now campaigning to have the viaduct lands placed into trust.
By treating my country as a cute and cuddly stuffed animal of a nation that is just “better” than the United States, users of the #InvadeUSCanada are effectively silencing Black, Indigenous and other voices in Canada. And they're enabling a typically Canadian sense of smug superiority over our American neighbours.
Most of all, they're helping perpetuate white supremacism in Canada, and an ongoing harmful legacy of violent colonialism that continues to this day.
Police killings in T&T have increased by 86 percent this year
Posted 30 June 2020 Screenshot of a video shared via WhatsApp and broadcast in a TTT Live Online video, showing police officers returning fire against protestors in east Port of Spain, Trinidad, on June 30, 2020.
On Saturday, June 27, hours after police officer Allen Moseley was shot dead in Morvant, a depressed area in the east of Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago's capital, officers from the Trinidad and Tobago Police Service's (TTPS) Guard and Emergency Branch—the unit in which Moseley served—went into the district and killed three men.
The police claim they were fired upon by the occupants of a vehicle, but security camera footage of the incident circulating via WhatsApp shows at least one of the men raising his arms in surrender.
Following the deaths of the three men, who have since been identified as Noel Diamond, Joel Jacobs, and Israel Clinton, protests erupted in the Morvant area on June 29. Residents blocked the road, burned tyres and other debris, and compared the deaths of the three men to the murder of George Floyd.
Clinton, who was acquitted of theft charges laid against him a few years ago, was suing the state for police brutality over a related beating incident that left him in hospital for weeks.
Lawyers representing the families of two of the deceased referred to their deaths as “extra-legal,” “arbitrary” and “summary executions,” and demanded that the officers involved be suspended from duty while the investigation takes place, a call that was echoed by at least one newspaper editorial and the NGO Womantra.
Commissioner of Police Gary Griffith and Alan Miguel, Chief Investigator at the Police Complaints Authority, the statutory body charged with independently investigating complaints against the TTPS, stated that an investigation the killings had been launched, but on the morning of June 30 the protestscontinued, blocking main transportation routes in and out of the capital city as people processed through the streets demanding justice and chanting “Don't shoot!”
Some demonstrations reportedly turned violent; at least one video shared on social media channels showed protestors shooting at the police and officers returning fire. A third-floor window at the attorney general's office was shot at. Protest actions also mushroomed, spreading to areas outside of the capital.
At about 11 am on June 30, Minister of National Security Stuart Young held a press conference in which he stated that community residents were being paid to cause civil unrest. He suggested that citizens should consider “who stands to gain” in such circumstances, making the point that “criminal elements are not always who we call gang members”. Protestors have refuted claims of payment.
One aspiring politician, Fuad Abu Bakr, son of Yasin Abu Bakr, the leader of the insurgents who staged an unsuccessful coup d'etat in 1990, was arrested, allegedly for disturbing the peace. Trinidad and Tobago is scheduled to hold general elections later this year.
The unrest was quelled by the authorities shortly after noon Trinidad time (UTC−04:00) on June 30, but the online discussion continued.
Youth activist and law student Kareem Marcelle, who has been advocating for justice in the deaths of three men, condemned the violent protests, explaining that responding to acts of illegality with other acts of illegality is counterproductive. In a public Facebook post, he pleaded:
Personally, I don’t support not encourage violent or destructive Protests! I’m begging y’all let’s not take away from what we want! We need Public Support for this! We can’t hurt nor distress the very same people we want to support our Cause! Let your voices be heard but PLEASE operate within the confines of the LAW! Don’t defeat the Purpose PLEASE! Right now the families are cooperating with our Legal Team, the PCA and the TTPS! Let’s not mess this up! Justice have to and will be served! #MorvantBlackLivesMatter
The unrest is also happening against a disturbing backdrop: over the past year, police killings in Trinidad and Tobago have increased by a startling 86 percent, with 43 people shot dead by police officers so far this year. Facebook user Terry-ann Roy was disturbed by the statistics:
Yal sharing a pic of one of the victims with a gun as if that negates the fact that we have a thing called DUE PROCESS and that the police aren't judge jury and executioners! All that shows is you have no understanding of what justice means. #morvantblacklivesmatter
Once you’re a young black man from a ‘Hotspot’ and you’re killed by Police Officers; there are many persons in society that AUTOMATICALLY Presumed that: 1. You’re a Criminal 2. Police deserve to kill you 3. Police are always right 4. Your life don’t matter 5. You’re Guilty by default You know what is the WORST part of it all? Many times its our OWN Black Brothers and Sisters pushing this agenda! And THAT is PRECISELY why many Police Officers feel as if they a Judge, Jury and Executioner! YOU Empower them when you defend their Actions!
One Twitter post attempted to explain why the protests were happening:
Still, many social media users remained at opposite ends of the divide:
Riots are the language of the unheard.
We expect the police to treat them like human beings BECAUSE they ARE human beings.
Stop policing the people who are the victims of police brutality and instead police the actual police. It's their actions under scrutiny… Not protestors.
While attorney Justin Phelps suggested that the response “needs to be far broader than the investigation of the one shooting”, Minister Young has tried to focus on the “robust” investigatory process of the PCA even as businesses in and around the capital city made the decision to close early, and the US Embassy in Trinidad and Tobago issued a security alert related to “civil unrest”.
Adding fuel to the fire was yet another police killing, this time of a woman in the disadvantaged area of Beetham Gardens. The incident sparked fresh protests in the presence of police officers. The police service put out a press statement shortly thereafter:
The Trinidad and Tobago Police Service (TTPS) wishes to assure the public that the well-orchestrated plan to destabilize the country by a few, has been quelled. So far, 72 persons have been arrested, and others are expected to be charged when investigations are completed.
There has been one casualty — a woman — and investigations are underway to determine the cause of her death.
Intelligence has revealed that this was an orchestrated plan that was led by several gang members, whereby the intention was to use the shooting of the three young men a few days ago, as a front to cover the planned plot to shut down the country.
Amid some public scepticism over the alleged destabilisation plan, the release also stated that the police force remains on high alert, with the nation being kept “under heavy police surveillance” for the next 48 hours. Written byJanine Mendes-Franco
Rubber bullets, the arrest of the son of a prominent Imam, and the burning of tyres and debris throughout a number of communities. Those events occurred just after 9am on Tuesday when protestors in Beetham, Sea Lots and Morvant staged protests to voice their anger over the killing of three men from Morvant on Saturday. The residents also held a protest in Morvant on Monday, accusing the police of assassinating the men, and called on the Commissioner of Police to intervene.
"Time for these monuments to meet the sledgehammer of justice"
Posted 11 June 2020 The statue of Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson, which stands near the entrance to Bridgetown, the Barbadian capital. Photo by Nick Kocharhook on Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0.
Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests have seen a global resurgence following the killing of George Floyd, an African American, by a white police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota in the United States.
One ripple effect of the protests has been the denigration and defacement of symbols of black oppression. The Caribbean, with its long history of occupation, has its own symbols of oppression to reconsider.
In Richmond, Virginia, on June 2, hundreds of protestors assembled in front of the statue of General Robert E. Lee, a American Civil War Confederate general, shouting, “Tear it down!” The state's governor, Ralph Northam, announced that the statue of Lee would be removed; the process has since been blocked by a court order.
On June 7, United Kingdom protestors tore down a statue of Bristol slave trader Edward Colston and stomped on it before throwing it into the harbour. A statue of slave trader Robert Milligan was also retired in front of the West India Docks in London.
Some have supported the symbolic act of reclaiming dignity and exposing long-celebrated racists, while others have condemned this method of protest.
In the Caribbean, calls to rename certain places have surged. King George V Park in Port of Spain, Trinidad, for instance, is also called Nelson Mandela Park. However, statuary has largely remained.
Most regional territories have robust examples of public art that honour the slave struggle, including Bussa, who led the largest slave rebellion in the history of Barbados; Cuffy, the leader of a 2,500-strong slave revolt in Guyana; and the “Redemption Song” statue at Jamaica's Emancipation Park, but there are also myriad examples of statues that reinforce the tainted narrative of discovery and ownership.
Several Caribbean nations are challenging the wisdom of having such statuary on public display. Feminist and university lecturer Gab Hosein observed on Facebook:
I don’t think there has been a global uprising of this geographical scope and diversity since the 1970s. […] Sparked by the BLM movement in the US and now expanded into decolonial struggle and dismantling racism more broadly, it does seem like — for almost the first time in 50 years — we are listening to another world breathing.
In Martinique, where a statue of French abolitionist Victor Schoelcher was toppled, two of the young women involved explained their decision in a YouTube video:
We, the young people of Martinique, are sick and tired of being surrounded by symbols that insult us. We were not the first to attack these symbols. Many before us have tried in vain to get rid of them […]
What is a statue? It is stating this is someone we admire for the impact he or she has had in the course of our history. […] Schoelcher was in favour of the compensation of the plantation owners; there are many transcripts proving that claim. If he had not, maybe it would have been different.
As the pair pointed out, the discussion is not new.
Barbadians, for instance, have been agitating for the removal of a statue of Horatio Nelson for decades. In 2017, Sir Hilary Beckles, vice-chancellor of The University of the West Indies and chairman of the Caribbean Community's (CARICOM) Reparations Committee, referred to Nelson as “a vile, racist, white supremacist [who] disposed of black people, and dedicated his political and military life to the cause of protecting Britain’s criminal possession of the 800,000 enslaved Africans held during his lifetime.”
In the wake of Floyd's horrific murder, the discussion around such monuments has grown more urgent.
There are currently several online petitions circulating in the region, including the Barbadian thrust to do away with Nelson's presence in the nation's capital.
Artist Annalee Davis, who shared the petition, noted:
[…] while I don't think to destroy the statue of Nelson is useful, I do think that relocating it to the museum or somewhere outside of National Heroes Square is viable and worth a national discussion. It is no longer called Trafalgar Square and he is not a hero. Wherever his statue is relocated to, it should include complete signage to clearly demonstrate who he was, what he did and his role in the colonial machinery that oppressed people.
In response to a commenter who challenged the idea of taking down the statuary with a “Where will it end?” argument, Davis clarified:
I don't believe that our tourism product should only tell the story from the perspective of those who enslaved people. There is a term being used around the world called ‘dark tourism’ and this is used in places like Auschwitz for example, to speak about concentration camps and tell the uncomfortable narratives that we want to turn away from. The statue of Christopher Columbus which sits on the entrance steps of Nassau's Government House. Photo by Robert Karma on Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Meanwhile, in the Bahamas, more than 3,000 people have signed a petition advocating for removal of the statue of Christopher Columbus, which looms over the front steps of Nassau's Government House.
A petition in Trinidad and Tobago agitating for the removal of two Columbus statues, explains:
We must face the fact […] that we continue to publicly glorify the murderous colonizer who initiated two of the greatest crimes in human history: the genocide of the Indigenous people of the Caribbean and the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, both of which are at the root of the racial injustice that our generation is protesting today.
Musician and actor Nickolai Salcedo, who publicly shared the petition on his Facebook page, asked:
Hey wouldn’t it be a cool bit of foresight if instead of waiting for a mob to tear down the statue of Columbus in [Port of Spain], the government was to preemptively remove it followed by removing any homages to our colonial past? […]
Our society […] still has monuments […] that literally litter and stain our landscape. Time for these monuments to the bloodthirsty to meet their blind dates; the sledgehammer of justice.
We can't pick and choose history, this is a significant part of history — Keep it, not glorify it — attach the correct story to it — hostile takeovers must always be remembered for the damage they are responsible for.
Journalist Judy Raymond, however, commenting on the removal of the Milligan statue, read the pulse of the matter very accurately:
[People] see a statue & assume that must be a great man. A plaque on an empty plinth might be more appropriate & useful. This is a discussion about visual memory.
Two white protestors display a sign reading “Silence is not an option”, as part of the George Floyd protests that took place in Washington D.C. on May 30, 2020. Photo by Victoria Pickering on Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
In the Caribbean, Floyd's death has prompted widespread online discussion about the region's own complicated race relations. In Trinidad and Tobago, this has been fuelled by disrespectful remarks from business owners and others widely regarded to occupy positions of privilege in society.
A key point of contention is the trotting out of the phrase “All Lives Matter” in response to expressions of support for the “Black Lives Matter” movement, with many older white or “white-adjacent” Trinbagonians failing to recognise how the phrase — which many of them interpret to be unifying or all-encompassing — is in fact just another form of belittlement.
Now, two young Trinbagonians, Anya Quesnel and New York-based Charlie Reid, have posted their thoughts about the issue, holding up a mirror to their community to show them the ways in which they participate in racism, in the hope that self-examination will inspire them to use their privilege to create equity. What is ‘white privilege'?
Recalling an incident in which his mother was given a delivery of pizza on trust because she had no cash with which to pay at the time of delivery, Reid defines white privilege this way:
Though your life may be chock-full with struggle, though you may have worked honest and hard for every cent you’ve ever earned, the colour of your skin has not been something that has significantly made your life harder. Your whiteness has not been something you must compensate for. Your whiteness has not caused you grave trauma. And if for some unique reason — in a Trinidadian context — your whiteness has caused you discomfort, never will it be comparable to the trauma our non-white brothers and sisters experience and have experienced.
In the Trinidad and Tobago context, however, Reid has noticed that privilege is closely intertwined with nepotism, which he says “has mated with race to evolve into this hybrid of white privilege that blows the white privilege I experience and have witnessed in America totally out of the water”. The problem with ‘not seeing colour’
In a multiethnic society like Trinidad and Tobago, diversity is visible. Quesnel put it into historical context:
One should never be looking at any part of Trininess without nuance and respect for the complexity of what it means to be a post-colonial (not decolonized) nation. […] By claiming that ‘we doh see colour, we doh see race’, we are ignoring that certain bodies are marked differently to others, and to harmful ends. When you tell your Black friends that you do not ‘see them as black’ you are 1) already displaying your assumption that blackness is inherently a ‘bad thing’, 2) you are invalidating the lived experiences of that friend that have been shaped by their blackness (as yours have been shaped by your whiteness). You are not being racist when you acknowledge that race exists. You are being racist when you fail to acknowledge your own prejudices.
Colour blindness is erasure. By not ‘seeing’ the colour of a person’s skin, you are not acknowledging their hurdles and your privileges. And so, stop being blind. If you are white, see your whiteness, see your neighbor’s blackness, see all the colours in between, celebrate it, witness it, and most importantly, take responsibility for the way the world treats you as a result of it. If you cannot see how the world treats you differently — that’s where your homework begins. Deal with the discomfort
Part of the process is having difficult conversations and confronting stark, often unpleasant realities. Quesnel's advice?
Sit with that discomfort. Ask why. Know that that your life is always, always, shaped by the privileges you have been afforded because of your whiteness.
Asserting that “reverse racism does not exist”, Reid added:
Perhaps, as a white Trini, you did in fact experience discomfort or harassment because of your whiteness. In Trinidad, as a racial minority, I have experienced hostility due to the colour of my skin [but] the cost of the discomfort that I experienced was inconceivably small to the cost people of colour experience due to racism and racist systems. So, we must discuss and continuously call out the systems at play. The issue of culture
In a multicultural space where claiming ownership of culture can get tricky, Quesnel challenged people to walk the talk:
Listen now. Let us be very aware of where the Trini ‘culture’ we parade so proudly came from: struggle. Specifically the struggle of black and brown Trinis to claim a space in the colonized society. […] If we so proud to be Trini to the bone why we bad talk public schools, send our children to private schools in the west when some of us sitting on money we could funnel into reforming public school education and bettering public facilities? Show that T&T pride by investing at home, by investing in home. Loving where you come from is more than patriotic talk for social capital. The language of race
Both young people were cognisant of the fact that the ways in which race is spoken about matters. Whether it's the use of pejorative terminology, denial that racism and colour-based social separation exists, or discussing sensitive issues like crime in terms of race, words have power.
Given that one of the most beloved lines in the country's national anthem is “Here every creed and race find an equal place”, Quesnel advised people to educate themselves and engage in dialogue:
Know YOUR history. Sit with the discomfort, rage, confusion that kind of work and introspection does. We need to examine and reimagine the ‘place’ every creed and race [is] trying to find equality in. […] If we cannot talk about the legacies of trauma, plundering, violence, genocide and prejudice that are ever present in our day to day- there will be no equality. If the art, voices, feelings, experiences and dreams of Black people are devalued constantly, there will be no equality.
Reid, who admitted he was struggling with “how to say this all perfectly” and conscious of not wanting to make himself “the center of this discourse”, admitted that he did once think of racism “as this bad thing that black people face”:
As I became more educated, I thought of racism as this bad thing that affects all people of colour, and not whites, and as a white person, it was my job not to be ignorant and make it harder for them. Today, I see racism as an issue that white people have. […] This is […] not to put white people at the center of this narrative, but rather to put white people at the center of accountability. […]
The time has long come for us as white people, especially as white Trinis, to talk about racism, as uncomfortable as it may be. It is not enough to say to yourself, ‘But I’m not racist.’ As — a golden tidbit — you are. We all are. I am. We are racist by the very fact that we operate and exist and benefit from the systems that have long favored our whiteness. Uprooting this will take lifetimes of concerted efforts. And people of colour have had enough. It’s time for us in our whiteness to say something, do something, fix something — fix it.
Protestors at the Black Lives Matter protest in Port of Spain, Trinidad, June 8, 2020. Photo by Jada Steuart, used with permission.
The horrific killing of George Floyd, an African American man who died from asphyxiation after a white police officer consistently pressed on his neck in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25, has been the catalyst for putting the concerns of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement back on the front burner.
Protestors at the second Black Lives Matter demonstration at the Queen's Park Savannah in Port of Spain, Trinidad. Photo by Ashley Thompson, used with permission.
BLM's mandate to campaign against violence and systemic anti-black racism which manifests dangerously in acts of police brutality have inspired similar protests around the world.
On June 8, more than 500 people joined in solidarity with #BlackLivesMatter by demonstrating in front of the United States Embassy in Port of Spain. It was the second public protest on the issue in four days, with this one reportedly being more heated than its predecessor, though certain segments of society remained antagonistic toward the cause.
“No justice, no peace,” were the words echoed as protestors assembled in the Queen's Park Savannah. Drivers passing along the perimeter of the city's main green space held their hands in fists out of cars, sounded their horns, and shouted the slogan “Black Lives Matter” in solidarity not only with African Americans, but also in acknowledgment of the deep-seated racism still festering under the surface of Trinidad and Tobago's multicultural society.
While there were altercations with the police, mainly over lack of consent with regard to an officer filming protestors, the protest was peaceful and harmonious overall. For the most part, protestors practised proper social distancing protocols, which were further enforced by the police present.
In fact, US Ambassador Joseph Mondello spent some time talking with protestors. He commended everyone who turned out for their message — and for wearing masks and practising safe social distancing.
Demonstrators at the Black Lives Matter protest in Port of Spain, Trinidad, June 8, 2020. Photo by Jada Steuart, used with permission.
In the wake of Floyd's death, discussions about race have dominated social media in Trinidad and Tobago, fuelled by insensitive remarks made by business owners like Gerald Aboud, whose Facebook comments telling black people to change their mindset were widely deemed racist. The consistent tone-deafness displayed by Aboud and several others has prompted calls for boycotts of their businesses, the decision by black entrepreneurs to pull their products from these stores and the creation of lists of black-owned businessesshared on social media.
At the protest, Aboud's name was seen multiple times on signs and placards:
The placard reads, “Dear Gerald Aboud, I did not steal my sneakers. Sincerely, ‘The Blacks.’ Photo by Jada Steuart, used with permission.
In a country that prides itself on equality and unity — the national anthem, after all, proclaims, “Here every creed and race find an equal place” — it is telling how much the #BlackLivesMatter movement has triggered such a response.
There is no disputing, however, that racism thrives in Trinidad and Tobago, in a multitude of ways: subtle or sometimes blatant racial tensions between different ethnicities, institutionalised racism that has traditionally made it harder for black people to thrive economically, and the fact that the majority of the country's wealth lies in the hands of the one percent.
Demonstrators on stilts, honouring the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival character of the Moko Jumbie (a tradition that originated from West Africa), at the Black Lives Matter protest in Port of Spain, Trinidad, June 8, 2020. Photo by Jada Steuart, used with permission.
As a postcolonial society, the issue of race is an integral part of Trinidad and Tobago's history; racist attitudes can be cross-generational.
Trinidad and Tobago Carnival, arguably the country's biggest national festival, is one example of this. Although its modern incarnation may look like a glorious street party, some Carnival bands remain segregated by class and colour. The festival's origins were rooted in rebellion against colonial authorities.
The inequitable systems Trinidad and Tobago inherited from Great Britain post-independence have not been completely dismantled. Many of those structures still cast a long and imposing shadow on the lives of black people, but if we are to judge by the turnout at the June 8 protest, young people especially no longer seem prepared to look away.
While the majority of the turnout was people of African descent, there were other people of colour and white Trinidadians present as well, coming together through a global movement aimed at challenging the systems that keep the wheels of racism turning.
They are speaking with their voices and their wallets, and they seem ready to have the tough discussions necessary for true equality to emerge. Many are also sharing resources, educating others about black history to foster greater understanding:
Groups are calling out racial injustice at home and abroad
Posted 5 June 2020 “Question your internalized racism” by Nicaraguan artist Vero Garabatos on Facebook, used with permission.
Indigenous and black Central Americans expressed solidarity online for the killing of George Floyd, a black man who was killed by four police officers in Minnesota, United States. In Central America, Afro-descendants and indigenous communities are raising awareness for their own suffering due to racism and violent state forces, particularly in countries with sizeable white or mestizo populations, such as Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua.
Black Central Americans — who are mainly Garifuna and Creole communities — mostly live on the region's Caribbean coast. For centuries, however, their inclusion in Central American societies has been minimal, if not exclusionary, according to historians. For example, black people were legally prohibited from immigrating to El Salvador from 1933 to the 1980s.
Paul Joseph López Oro, a doctoral candidate in the Department of African and African Diaspora Studies at the University of Texas, argues that black Central Americans are alienated in Central American countries where ‘mestizaje‘ — people whose ancestry are mixed between white and indigenous — is still a prevailing ideal.
Until today, indigenous and black people — often at the frontlines of environmental defense — are dispossessed of their lands, harassed, or killed. Impunity is prevalent for these crimes. Calls for justice at home and abroad
Costa Rica's Vice-President Epsy Campbell Barr has condemned the killing of George Floyd on May 30 and called on the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to produce a special report on all forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, afro-phobia and related intolerance against African-American citizens. She continued to tweet in support of Black Lives Matter protests in the United States.
No podemos guardar silencio y ser cómplices de la injusticia, de la brutalidad y del dolor. Extiendo mi profunda admiración a todas las personas que marchan y levantan los ideales de la justicia, de la igualdad y del amor #BlackLivesMatter#BlackLivesMatterCR#GeorgeFloydpic.twitter.com/15lAROvjDH
We cannot keep silence and be accomplices of injustice, brutality and pain. I extend my profound admiration for all the people who are marching and highlighting the ideals of justice, equality and love. #BlackLivesMatter#BlackLivesMatterCR#GeorgeFloyd
Also in Costa Rica, an Afro-Costa Rican, feminist and anti-racist organization CostaRica Afro organized a zoom meeting to demonstrate against racism in the world.
More than 500 people virtually demonstrated in Costa Rica against racism in the world. The initiative was promoted by @CostaRicaAfro #BlackLivesMatter#BlackOutTuesday
In Guatemala, Indigenous communities have suffered genocide at the hands of state forces during counter-insurgency operations between 1960 and 1996. UN special rapporteur for indigenous rights, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, noted that Guatemala suffers from structural discrimination and exclusion of indigenous peoples. Indigenous communities have immediately expressed their solidarity with events happening in the United States and invited Guatemalans to reflect on racist dynamics within Guatemala.
Maya Kakchiquel columnist and anthropologist from Guatemala, Sandra Batz, tweeted as early as May 27 about George Floyd's death.
George Floyd fue asesinado, el racismo fue el móvil de este crimen. Las personas racializadas vivimos el abuso y la impunidad de los Estados racistas, que se vuelcan en contra de nuestras vidas en lugar de protegerlas.
George Floyd was murdered and racism was the motive of that crime. We people of color live the abuse and impunity of racist States, which turn their backs on our lives instead of protecting us.
A few days later, Batz wrote an opinion piece that starts with “racism kills,” stating that:
It is easier to perceive the racism of others, that which is exercised in other countries, than one's own, than that which is practiced as a nation against a majority native population, who are despised and killed, yes, killed. Illustrator Sucely Puluc, who is indigenous Maya K'iche’ and Kaqchikel, expressed that she wants the movements against racism to have lasting effects and not be an online trend.
“We have denounced racism all our lives. Its not only a #trend.” Indigenous Maya K'iche’ human rights defender Andrea Ixchíu created Black Lives Matter solidarity posters. Art by Andrea Ixchíu, used with permission.
Honduran Garifuna, mixed descendants of African and Amerindian Arawak, live under frequent attacks, according to Garifuna rights organization, OFRANEH. Central American News collected the data:
In Honduras alone, 105 violent acts were committed against the Garifuna people between 2008 and 2019, including murders, judicial threats, forced displacement, sexual violence and disappearances, according to OFRANEH. That makes for nearly one violent occurrence per month (0.8) in a community of 43,111 people.
For years OFRANEH, led by Miriam Miranda, has called for an end to the killings of Garifuna people. Miranda also tweeted with regards to U.S. events:
La juventud está haciendo un llamado para que se detenga esa barbarie que se comete contra lxs negrxs en ese país que se dice ejemplo de la “democracia”. Ese es un sistema racista, depredador y asesino al que han vendido en todo el planeta como lo mejor del mundo para vivir. pic.twitter.com/CkQtILgaOP
The youth is calling out so that the barabarity committed against black people in that country, a so-called example of “democracy,” is stopped. It's a racist, predatory and murderous system that they have been selling all over the planet as the best place on earth to live.
