It was satisfying to see the February 12 headline, "28 gay Jamaicans granted asylum in US last year" because indeed, gay Jamaicans are running for their lives. They seek refuge from some in academia, the self-righteous, political grandstanding and poor policing.
Where one, two, three or more of these "institutions" are gathered touching anything concerning the "funny-man" or "she-man," then "Father Hate" and "Uncle Murder" are in the midst to do Jamaica's good.
Who will deny the usefulness of the frequent islandwide homophobic rhetoric in uniting "Holy-Ghost tongue-talking" Jamaicans, rude boys coming together to salute with guns, some politicians standing in oneness to applaud because there will be a Gomorrah-free Cabinet, and lousy music artistes firing up a crowd, not with lyrics but with "fire bun them"?
And where are the academic divas and wisdom rebels to inject logic, to water down the fire, clean up the blood and bury the gay murder rate?
Are the divas and rebels in an intellectual fowl coop hiding?
Jamaica is not the only murderous country. The problem with much of Jamaica is that it seems to be obsessed with violence. Inflicting blood, pain and shame give too many Jamaicans a consensual mood which appears to have become a cultural thrill.
Indeed, it would be naïve of anyone to think that America is paradise for those gay Jamaicans whom it has granted refuge. America has many cases of homophobia where there is a higher level of alarm when it's homophobia against whites and a lower level for other races.
That is something America should be ashamed of. There doesn't seem to be much evidence that America has sufficient conscience on that matter.
However, Immigration Equality rightly understands that America is nonetheless far safer for gay Jamaicans.
Pity that most Jamaicans are still in such denial!
Dadland Maye
New York, New York
dadland@gmail.com
ENDS
My notes:
The two questions highlighted in bold above in the letter are fundamental ones for us and especially those in advocacy in particular , they ask in essence why aren't the intellectuals and those in academia who are gay and who know better and are even friends with some of the same politicians who know better that the Buggery Law should be scrapped but grandstand in parliament but privately have different views due to fear of political suicide. The letter writer is directing the criticism where it belongs which I and a few others have gone against the grade and not tow the line.
As for the "gay murder rate" referred to there are issues that are misconstrued even by the community itself I fear, the conflation with downlow/clandestine homosexual affairs gone wrong vs abuse to include power differentials and the homo negativity from paedophilia with the psychology of sexual abuse are issues the community and experts are going to have to carefully sift through solve and then present to the nation to get the discussion going properly late as it is, better late than never.
More to come on this though in the meantime see the tabs linked to this post below to see previous posts on downlow issues and related matters.
Peace and tolerance
H
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2 comments:
The writer is right that the fashionably homophobic UWI intellectuals in the social and medical sciences, like Orville Taylor and Trini Wayne West, who use scholarship to prop up their bigotry, outnumber those, mainly feminists and gender scholars, who have spoken out with integrity and clarity on these issues, and the many others (several of them gay and lesbian) who choose silence in the face of the mob.
But let's at least acknowledge, cultivate and support those Mona scholars like Robert Carr (who's now left the academy), Jamaican scholars like Tracy Robinson at Cavehill and community intellectuals like Esther Figueroa who are doing this work; and let's not make them invisible.
I also think we in the Caribbean have a bit to learn from African activists about coalition and about the trap of single-issue GLBT politics. I imagine what we need is not so much to carefully sift through and solve things, the headcentred approach we are inclined to take in the Caribbean, but to take an unambivalent stance with others on questions of predatory sexuality that shows we share their values.
here here
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