Belgium Acknowledges Racist Past with Removal of King Leopold II Statue

The Black Lives Matter movement in the United States has encouraged many to speak up against the racism that continues to plague the world. Along with addressing present injustices, people are starting to take a look at the past. In the U.S., there have been numerous removals of statues of Confederate soldiers, leaders and slave owners such as Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and John B. Castleman. This movement to acknowledge the past has now sparked international attention.

On June 9, Belgium removed a statue in Antwerp of King Leopold II, a tyrant who took control of the Democratic Republic of Congo during the 19th century. Children in Belgian schools learn that King Leopold was a hero who brought civilization to Africa. While his reign expanded European colonization, it cost the lives of millions who were exploited due to brutal labor practices. 

The reality of King Leopold II is much darker. He ruled the Congo between 1865 and 1909 as many other European countries were starting to settle into Africa for its resources and land. To Leopold, though, the Congo became his personal possession instead of a Belgian colony. Under his orders, troops worked men to death to meet his high demands for rubber and ivory. If a village was unable to produce the quota set by Leopold, its residents often had their hands severed as punishment. Women and children were often held captive and sent away to Belgium, and an estimated 10 million Congolese lost their lives. Congo became a part of Belgium only after Leopold’s death, and the country gained its independence in 1960. 

After hearing about the death of George Floyd in the U.S., many young Belgians began protesting in the streets asking their government to acknowledge the truth of its past. Across the country, many have taken their frustrations out on Leopold’s statues by setting them on fire and painting them red to symbolize the bloodshed Belgium’s colonization brought to the people of the Congo. After gaining 64,000 signatures on a petition, Belgium is working to remove all of Leopold’s statues from the country. 

Vandalized statue of King Leopold II near Brussels. Yves Herman. CC 2.0

There is a larger motive behind the removals, however. As mentioned, King Leopold II is praised for his contributions to Belgium’s colonization. These statues stand as a reminder of that racist past while also praising it. In this case, King Leopold is viewed as “doing what is best” for the country even as he forced millions into forced labor and killed them in the process. It has been embedded in the minds of Belgians that this behavior is somewhat acceptable. With the removal of statues like this, it is hoped that people’s minds will change to acknowledge that this type of behavior is never OK.

Eva Ashbaugh

is a Political Science and Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies double major at the University of Pittsburgh. As a political science major concentrating on International Relations, she is passionate about human rights, foreign policy, and fighting for equality. She hopes to one day travel and help educate people to make the world a better place.

How the 24-hour News Cycle Perpetuates Racial Bias in the Case of Coronavirus

Sensationalism and the 24-hour news cycle aided in killing journalistic integrity, and it also aids in perpetuating racial bias, fear, and panic. Constant reporting forces news stations to air stories that will maintain a captive audience. There is only so much news (or so many sides to a story) that can be reported on in a day. This forces 24-hour news channels to come up with content that will fill time slots and keep the audience tuned in. Since the ongoing coverage is usually focused on one particular subject or event, the audience is subjected to a constant barrage of narrowly focused facts and opinions. As a result, fear turns into panic, which can often lead to deadly results.

Coronavirus is the latest epidemic that is fueling racism, panic, and mistrust. This fear is exacerbated by sensational news and 24-hour reportage. Amidst “doomsday prepping” and the price gouging of masks and hand sanitizer, is the worst result of overblown news coverage of the coronavirus: physical and verbal attacks fueled by racism. Racist attacks against Asians in the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, and across Europe have been linked to coronavirus. Overblown news coverage of coronavirus, along with ignorance and misinformation, has helped lead to this spike in racist assaults across the globe.

One video making rounds on Twitter shows a New York subway passenger spraying what appears to be a can of Febreze in the direction of an Asian passenger while shouting at him to move away from him. Tanny Jiraprapasuke, who is Thai American, uploaded a video on Facebook of a xenophobic rant directed toward her on the Los Angeles Metro. Singaporean student Jonathan Mok posted a detailed account and pictures of his battered face on Facebook after he was assaulted on Oxford Street in London.

It does not help that some media purposely (or carelessly) enforce racial bias. On March 1, the New York Post published a story about the first confirmed case of coronavirus in Manhattan. They tweeted a link to the story along with an image of an Asian man on Main Street in Flushing, Queens, which has a large Asian American population. New York’s first confirmed case of coronavirus is a woman in her late 30s. On the same day, the New York Times used a photograph of two older Asian women wearing medical masks on a Facebook post about the same first coronavirus case in New York. The New York Post and the New York Times’s decision to use photographs of Asian Americans helped further perpetuate harmful stereotypes and fearmongering against Asians.

Roger Keil, a professor in the environmental studies department at York University said, “To combat racism, people in the public eye, including politicians and media outlets, have to begin by uncoupling the disease from its origin point.” If the media continues to be irresponsible by reporting in a way that racializes epidemics, xenophobic and racist attacks like those related to the coronavirus, SARS, and Ebola will continue to plague our societies. Coronavirus is not an excuse to discriminate. It certainly does not.

Asiya Haouchine

is an Algerian-American writer who graduated from the University of Connecticut in May 2016, earning a BA in journalism and English. She was an editorial intern and contributing writer for Warscapes magazine and the online/blog editor for Long River Review. She is currently studying for her Master's in Library and Information Science.

@AsiyaHaou

An Inuit Approach to Cancer Care Promotes Self-Determination and Reconciliation

For thousands of years, Inuit have adapted to the changes in their environment, and continue to find new and innovative ways to survive. 

But life expectancy among populations in Inuit Nunangat (the traditional territory of Inuit in Canada) is an average of 10 years less than that of the general Canadian population.

Cancer is a leading cause of this disparity. Inuit experience the highest mortality rates from lung cancer in the world, and mortality rates of some other cancers continue to increase disproportionately.

Inuit communities tend to be self-reliant and are renowned for working together for a common goal, which is evident in their self-governance and decision-making activities. They have also endured a long history of cultural insensitivity and negative health-care experiences that span generations

Map of Inuit Nunangat (Inuit Regions of Canada) (Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami)

The ways the Canadian health-care system interacts with Inuit populations plays an important part in this health disparity. And there is an urgent need for Inuit to be able to access and receive appropriate health care. 

Elder Peter Irniq speaks about the remarkable Inuit capacity for survival in extreme conditions

In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) report made 94 recommendations in the form of Calls to Action. Seven of these Calls to Action specifically relate to health. They explain the importance of engaging community members, leaders and others who hold important knowledge in the development of health care.

As members of a team of Inuit and academic health-care researchers, we have been working with health-system partners to support Inuit in cancer care. We focus on enhancing opportunities for Inuit to participate in decisions about their cancer care through the shared decision-making model, in a research project we call “Not Deciding Alone.”

We travel thousands of miles for cancer care

Our collective success in addressing the TRC Calls to Action will require health research to focus on addressing the health-care inequities experienced by Inuit, First Nations and Métis populations in ways that take action to promote self-determination. 

This is important as current health-care models do not often support Indigenous values, ways of knowing and care practices.

Poor cultural awareness in our mainstream health-care systemsdiscourages Indigenous people from seeking care and engaging with health services. It increases the risk that Indigenous people will encounter racism when seeking care. 

Small boats make their way through the Frobisher Bay inlet in Iqaluit on Aug. 2, 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

There are many documented instances of our health-care system’s failure to provide appropriate health care to Indigenous people, due to unfair assumptions and demeaning and dehumanizing societal stereotypes.

These health system failures discourage people from seeking care, and have resulted in death, as in the case of Brian Sinclair,who died after a 34-hour wait in a Winnipeg hospital emergency room in September 2008.

There can also be significant physical barriers to care for Inuit. Critical health services such as oncology specialists and treatments are often located in urban centres such as Ottawa, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Montréal and St John’s, thousands of kilometres away from remote communities in Inuit Nunangat. This leaves many Inuit negotiating stressful urban environments, dealing with cultural dislocation and navigating complex health systems without the benefit of community support networks.

People must fly out of remote communities for cancer treatment. (Alex Hizaka), Author provided

During our research, an Inuit peer support worker explained what it can be like for those who travel far from their family and community for their care: 

“People come with no idea of why, and we are having to bridge two worlds for them. Often patients have no idea why health-care providers tell them to get on a plane, and then they think they are coming for treatment for three days and then it becomes two weeks. It is a tough situation as often people have no money, no support. People need to be able to explain their situation and how it is for them. People need to know that they are not alone.”

Research shows that these geographical challenges significantly impact access to health care and are often exacerbated by language barriers. Together these factors may make people vulnerable to additional harms unrelated to the health conditions for which they seek treatment.

Patients and health-care providers work together

Shared decision-making is an important evidence-informed strategy that holds the potential to promote patient participation in health decisions

In this model, health-care providers and patients work togetherusing evidence-based tools and approaches and arrive at decisions that are based on clinical data and patient preferences— to select diagnostic tests, treatments, management and psycho-social support packages. 

Shared decision-making is considered a high standard of carewithin health systems internationally and it has been found to benefit people who experience disadvantage in health and social systems. 

Shared decision-making has also been found to promote culturally safe care, and has the potential to foster greater engagement of Inuit with their health-care providers in decision-making. 

The concept of cultural safety was developed to improve the effectiveness and acceptability of health care with Indigenous people. Culturally safe care identifies power imbalances in health-care settings — to uphold self-determination and decolonization in health-care settings for Indigenous people. 

The aim of a shared decision-making approach is to engage the patient in decision-making in a respectful and inclusive way, and to build a health-care relationship where patient and provider work together to make the best decision for the patient.

Most importantly, our approach has emphasized ways of partnering that align with the socio-cultural values of research partners and community member participants, both to develop tools and create approaches to foster shared decision-making. The term “shared decision-making” translates in Inuktitut to “Not Deciding Alone” and so that is the name of our project.

The results are outcomes that Inuit are more likely to identify as useful and relevant and that respect and promote Inuit ways, within mainstream health-care systems.

Self-determination through Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit

Our research uses the guiding principles of Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit — a belief system that seeks to serve the common good through collaborative decision-making — as the foundation for a strengths-based approach to promote Inuit self-determination and self-reliance. 

Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit principles have been passed down from one generation to the next and are firmly grounded in the act of caring for and respecting others. 

There is important learning taking place within academic and health-care systems that involves deepening understandings of what “patient-oriented care” means. We need to learn how to do research in partnership with those who are the ultimate knowledge users in cancer-care systems — patients.

In our work, Inuit partners and community members are leading the development of shared decision-making tools and approaches, building on their strengths and resiliency. Our research and health systems are beneficiaries of these partnerships that hold potential to create health care that is welcoming and inclusive for all. 

With guidance and support from Inuit and more broadly, from Indigenous partners, we are learning how to take action on the TRC recommendations, and to make respect and kindness integral to best practice in research and health care.

Janet Jull is a Assistant Professor, School of Rehabilitation Therapy, Queen's University, Ontario

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON THE CONVERSATION

Birth Fate: Institutionalized Racism in New Zealand Prisons

New Zealand has the second highest incarceration rate in the Western World, beat only by the United States. Yet, there is an unequal distribution throughout prisons, with Maori making up majority of those incarcerated. The explanation lies in history.

Historic prison in Dunedin, New Zealand. Benchill. BY-SA 3.0.

New Zealand has been praised for its efforts in incorporating aspects of indigenous culture into everyday life. Road signs are posted in both English and Maori. Students in school learn Maori history and culture. The All Blacks do the haka. But looking beneath the surface it is apparent that racism against the Maori culture still very much exists. This is no more evident as in the incarceration rates. Maori make up about 15 percent of New Zealand’s population but over 50 percent of the prison population. This difference has to be examined not just on a criminal justice level but also from a historical perspective. 

A study from the University of Otago, found that there three main reasons behind the high incarceration rates for Maori people. They are structural racism, intergenerational trauma, and colonization. Of course these three are all intertwined with colonization being the cause for intergenerational trauma and structural racism. The biggest effects of colonization come from subordination and institutionalized change. Having a change in the value of wealth – to one of monetary and property value – and being on the losing end of that spectrum creates a never ending struggle. Maori justice system before colonization revolved around group accountability and following tikanga, the Maori just way of being. Prisons involve punishment and individual causation. Adapting to a system whose values are drastically different than your own and having to fight for your land and culture, has left the Maori at a disadvantage. 

On an individual level, majority of inmates had been a victim to violence, had a mental health diagnosis or brain injury, did not have proper schooling, and/or had a parent who also had been in correctional facilities. Poverty on its own is a huge factor in crime statistics with first acts being committed out of necessity. Add on top of that, generational histories of crime, violence, and mental health, it is hard to break the cycle.  

If you look both at the history of New Zealand and the history of the person, it is no surprise that institutionalized racism exists. The current government is working on reducing the number of people incarcerated but it is hard to tackle the problem when Maori representation at the government level is lacking. They are looking towards examples from Norway, with community correction facilities, and there are programs working to bring Maori values to prisons. But until more effort is done to correct inequalities in wealth, education, and healthcare it may be hard to have lasting change. 

DEVIN O’DONNELL’s interest in travel was cemented by a multi-month trip to East Africa when she was 19. Since then, she has continued to have immersive experiences on multiple continents. Devin has written for a start-up news site and graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in Neuroscience.

Think Confederate Monuments are Racist? Consider Pioneer Monuments

In San Francisco, there is an an 800-ton monument that retells California history, from the Spanish missions to American settlement. Several bronze sculptures and relief plaques depict American Indians, white miners, missionaries and settlers. A female figure symbolizing white culture stands atop a massive stone pillar.

The design of the “pioneer monument” was celebrated in newspapers across the country when it was erected in 1894. Today, however, activists have argued that the monument – particularly its depiction of a Spanish missionary and Mexican “vaquero,” or cowboy, towering over an American Indian – is demeaning to American Indians.

Frank Happersberger’s pioneer monument, San Francisco, California, 1894. Lisa Allen.

Should the city take down part of this 125-year-old monument?

Many cities are removing or reinterpreting their Confederate monuments, with the understanding that they commemorate racism. But few Americans realize that pioneer monuments placed across the country are also racist.

As my research and forthcoming book on pioneer monuments since the 1890s show, most early pioneer statues celebrated whites dominating American Indians.

Confederate and pioneer monuments

Since at least 2015, cities across the United States have debated what to do with more than 700 Confederate monuments.

After the Civil War, grieving widows raised funds to place monuments to soldiers in southern cemeteries. But most statues of Confederate leaders and foot soldiers were put up around 1900 by heritage organizations to honor the “Lost Cause.”

The “Lost Cause” is the idea that that the Civil War began as a heroic defense against northern aggression. In fact, the Civil War was primarily fought to defend slavery.

In the past few years, cities such as New Orleans, Louisiana and Baltimore, Maryland have chosen to remove their Confederate statues. Activists tore down a Confederate soldier statue in Durham, North Carolina last year.

By contrast, there has been far less attention on the roughly 200 pioneer monuments erected for similar reasons around the same time.

The earliest pioneer monuments were put up in midwestern and western cities such as Des Moines, Iowa and San Francisco, California. They date from the 1890s and early 1900s, as whites settled the frontier and pushed American Indians onto reservations.

Those statues showed white men claiming land and building farms and cities in the West. They explicitly celebrated the dominant white view of the Wild West progressing from American Indian “savagery” to white “civilization.”

Deviations from that script produced public controversy. For example, Denver residents in 1907 vocally opposed prominent American sculptor Frederick MacMonnies’s plan for a pioneer monument. MacMonnies proposed a large stone pillar surrounded by bronze hunters, miners and settlers similar to San Francisco’s celebrated monument. MacMonnies’s model included a mounted Plains American Indian warrior atop the pillar to show American Indians yielding to white settlement.

But Denver residents expected the figure at the top of the pillar to represent the pinnacle of progress, like “Eureka,” the female figure representing the spirit of California on San Francisco’s monument.

Denver’s residents argued that the monument needed a white man on top, so MacMonnies revised his design, replacing the American Indian warrior with frontiersman and American Indian fighter Kit Carson, on horseback.

August Leimbach, Madonna of the Trail, Springfield, Ohio, 1928.

By the 1920s, whites controlled most western lands, and they stopped depicting American Indians in their pioneer monuments. New pioneer monuments from Maryland to California focused on western women. Pioneer mothers in sunbonnets stood for white “civilization” winning in the West. And they offered a conservative model of womanhood to contrast flappers wearing short dresses and bobbed hair and women’s growing sexual freedom.

More recent monuments, such as Goodland, Kansas’s “They Came to Stay” and Omaha, Nebraska’s “Pioneer Courage,” do not directly engage racial politics. As their titles suggest, these statues honor pioneer families’ grit, and they teach local history.

But these statues still represent a racist view, ignoring the cost of white settlement on Native lands. Like earlier monuments, they reinforce white dominance and erase ethnic diversity in the American West.

Pioneer monuments today

The recent debate about Confederate monuments has sparked some discussion of pioneer monuments in a few places. In April, Kalamazoo, Michigan removed its 1940 “Fountain of the Pioneers” because local residents disliked its depiction of a white settler looming over an American Indian.

After decades of protest, San Francisco debated taking down the depiction of a Spanish missionary towering over an American Indian from the 1894 pioneer monument.

In the 1990s, activists persuaded the city to place a plaque telling the dark side of California history in front of the statue. But today’s protesters argued that plaque, hidden by landscaping, is not enough. They want “Early Days” – if not the entire monument – taken down.

The San Francisco Arts Commission agrees, but the Board of Appeals blocked its removal in April.

On September 14, 2018, the “Early Days” statue was removed from the San Francisco monument and placed in storage. In April 2019, about 150 Native American leaders and youth from across California posed for photographs on the empty base where “Early Days” once stood. The photos will be part of the San Francisco Art Commission’s American Indian Initiative.

Each pioneer monument has its own history and local meaning. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. But communities are beginning to consider removing or reinterpreting these monuments to white conquest.

CYNTHIA PRESCOTT is an Associate Professor of History at the University of North Dakota.

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON THE CONVERSATION

Does Humanitarian Aid Have a 'White Saviour' Problem?

American missionary Renee Bach travelled to Uganda in 2007 when she was just 18 years-old and founded Serving His Children (SHC), a nonprofit organisation she said would help Ugandan women care for ill and malnourished children. Critics, though, say Bach, who had no experience in either development work or medicine, performed complicated medical procedures on hundreds of children.

In 2015, Ugandan authorities closed SHC's facility in the town of Jinja - where a number of children were reported to have died - but the organisation still operates in other parts of the country. A lawsuit brought by two women who say their children died under SHC’s care has been adjourned until January 2020, according to the Uganda-based legal services group Women’s Probono Initiative.

Bach’s case has again highlighted the issue of medical "voluntourism", while raising questions of whether some charities in the developing world have a “white saviour problem”. In response, Uganda-based social workers Olivia Alaso and Kelsey Nielsen began the No White Saviors campaign to educate and advocate for better practices in mission and development work.

In this episode, The Stream takes a look at why some Westerners get to work in the developing world without adequate experience, and what groups like No White Saviors are doing to hold them accountable.

Fresh Wounds: Incident at Beach is Newest Example of Strained Race Relations in South Africa

Recently a group of protesters took to the shores of the Clifton 4th beach, one of the more popular beaches in Cape Town, to complain about what they perceived to be racial profiling at the hands of a local security firm. Professional Protection Alternatives, or PPA, was apparently hired by local residents to clear out all black visitors to the beach shortly before Christmas of last year. The security company responded to these allegations, claiming that they were simply trying to protect nearby residents from crime. The incident has stirred up tensions in Cape Town that still linger from South Africa’s recent history with Apartheid.

Apartheid, which means “separateness” or “apartness” in Afrikaans, was a system of institutionalized racism that pervaded in South Africa from 1948 until the early 1990s. Also known as “White Minority Rule,” it was primarily used to ensure the dominion of white South Africans over their black counterparts. Policies included the segregation of parks, beaches, and other public places. The system was dismantled by activists like former president Nelson Mandela but the visitors who were removed from the beach felt that the actions of PPA were reminiscent of the Cape Town of old. Dan Plato, the current mayor of Cape Town, spoke publicly about the incident, claiming that PPA had no right to remove anyone from the beach, but also defended the security firm, stating that the removals were not racially motivated. Meanwhile, Patricia de Lille, the former mayor of Cape Town, joined in the protests, encouraging all who were removed from the beach to press charges against PPA. De Lille stated that actions of the firm went against “hard-won constitutional rights.” In a country with such a recent history of racial conflict, it doesn't take much to re-open old wounds.

Former president Nelson Mandela was instrumental in the ending of Apartheid. South Africa The Good News / www.sagoodnews.co.za. CC BY 2.0.

The incident at Clifton is the latest in a series of racial altercations that have occurred in South Africa. In 2016, real estate agent Penny Sparrow described black South Africans as “uneducated monkeys” in a Facebook post. Sparrow was charged with Crimen Injuria, the willful impairment of another person’s dignity. At her hearing, Sparrow said that she would “strive to be a better citizen, respecting others and working toward making our country a better place.” In August of 2018, Johannesburg businessman Adam Catzavelos caused an uproar on social media when he posted a video of himself at a beach in Greece and expressed his relief that there were no black people there. Catzavelos’ family promptly fired him from their food manufacturing company and expressed outrage over his comments before going into hiding to avoid potential backlash. Despite South Africa’s recent steps toward tolerance, racism is still an overarching issue that hinders relations between the many ethnicities that make the country their home.

Protesters at the Clifton 4th beach marched, chanted, and even sacrificed a sheep in their demonstrations against racism in Cape Town. They claimed the guards employed by PPA were specifically briefed to keep blacks from other townships from patronizing the beach, claims which have yet to be substantiated. Their protests have drawn the support of the Economic Freedom Fighters, or EFF, an organization devoted to humanitarian issues in South Africa. Other organizations, such as the Black Land First group have also voiced their support for the protesters on Clifton beach, though their views are considered by many to be more radical from those of the EFF. Meanwhile, some citizens of Cape Town plan to press animal cruelty charges against the protesters for slaying the sheep. These events are a prime example of how quickly recently formed ties can unravel.

JONATHAN ROBINSON is an intern at CATALYST. He is a travel enthusiast always adding new people, places, experiences to his story. He hopes to use writing as a means to connect with others like himself. 

What I Couldn’t Admit Until Now After Months Of Traveling While Black

I’ve been trying to find a way to write this since I’ve gotten back to the United States with a single backpack and next to no money. For the four months that I was away, the United States of America seemed to unravel in a way that I hadn’t seen before and my bones felt so excited, so prepared to come back.

Starting in December 2016, I traveled throughout the Philippines for three months and spent another month in South Korea. This trip was integral, influential in so many ways to me. I dove headfirst into a new region of the world that I’d previously not given much thought to and I can still recall sitting in this bedroom only a week or two before that trip began and thinking, “What am I getting myself into?” as I researched the ins and outs of some of the things that I might experience.

Sometimes I feel that there is a switch in black people specifically. We tread through the world as flawlessly or strongly as possible. We climb ladders, break glass ceilings, win athletic events, and do so in the name of a lineage that has been stripped away from us. The black experience in the United States is so unique and tortured and real in ways that is still hard to express to people who haven’t been born into it or have spent their entire lives trying to contextualize it.

I believe this switch in each black person is a way to protect us, push us forward, and allow us to navigate spaces that we are not always readily welcomed into. As I traveled through the Philippines more specifically, this switch was turned on all the time. From the very first days of stepping off the plane and meeting people of different backgrounds and classes and political ideas, I was faced with a wave of self protection that was layered into how I interacted with anyone that I met.

Kids would follow me in the streets and point. Some people would ask to take photos. Others would ask questions about my dreadlocks. One time in Chinatown, my friend exclaimed behind me, “Wow, a black person!” because as he walked behind me in the crowded city streets of Manila, it became so obvious that people just didn’t stare as I walked by. They gawked. Kids sometimes called me the N-word because it was probably what they’d seen black people call each other in rap videos or movies.

“Wassup my brother?” was also a common thing for kids to say to me.

I had moments where I had to explain the basics of anti-blackness in the United States to some Filipinos. One time a woman told me that my hair looked crazy. One night I was lost while trying to meet friends and at a club. Filipino cops stopped me and asked if I needed help. During their gracious car ride, they asked me if it was true that black men had bigger penises.

Layer all of this with the fact that I am queer and understand that much of the world has a complicated relationship/ideal of acceptance towards the LGBT community; you can begin to guess why this guardedness was a part of how I interacted with people.

As a black person, I have learned to demand presence in so many spaces that I step into. As an activist, I try to be intersectional and aware of the political context of spaces that I enter. I could never go wholeheartedly into another country as an American and expect everyone to be educated on the nuances of life as queer, black male in the United States. Culture is deep and can be changed in an instant or over the course of decades, centuries.

But with this deep need to understand things as they come, feelings often get muddled. In South Korea and the Philippines, I would let people touch my hair, something that’s sort of an unspoken violation of respecting black folks and their bodies. At the time, I chalked it up to exhaustion, a lack of willingness to fight for respect for my racial experience at all times. Now that I am faced with the prospect of wondering if I should go back to the region of SE Asia for another trip, I am finally able to realize the whopping truth of what I often felt.

Humiliation

I felt humiliated and tried to stuff it inside of myself, wake up every day and face the adventure of being a backpacking entrepreneur on the other side of the world, something that is a privilege of it’s own. But the truth was that I’d drained my bank account to be there. I constantly thought,

“Why the fuck did I travel across the world to deal with this racist bullshit?”

Most of the time I was too afraid to express these feelings to Filipino people, almost in the same web of anxiety that I used to have when censoring myself when around white folks here in the States. In fall of 2016, I helped organize a memorial for Ty’re King, a 13 year old boy shot and killed by Columbus Police. At the memorial, a white guy came over and expressed his condolences. Then he compared the 13 year old boy to Osama Bin Laden and tried to spew his white privilege and fragility all over a space meant to show respect for black pain and this boy’s life.

I remember being angry, telling the guy to get the fuck away from me and how hot and immediate my body felt. So much of the past three years to me has been trying to dig into the power that allows myself to believe, “It’s okay to be angry. It’s okay to admit that you were humiliated. It’s okay to pop off.”

As black folks, we are so often used to being told that we hold the weight of our entire community on our backs. This is a reinforced ideal, that for black folks, is so different than the language around other racial groups. If you are black, how many times have you heard the following?

Don’t be hanging with those white folks and thinking you can do all the things that they do.

You gotta work twice as hard to get half of what they do.

Those white folks will be watching you.

I took care of you so you could hopefully take care of me and your father one day.

All of these are signifiers of the complicated bridge that weaves the black experience. We want to be seen and heard, but when we are denied representation, we claw our way into spaces and tell ourselves that we are “unapologetically black”.

Issa Rae, the creator of the show Insecure, recently said, “So much of the media presents blackness as fierce and flawless. I’m not.” This statement immediately made sense to me because the Strong Black Woman stereotype has been around for a reason. Self care is discussed, but how do we exercise it? Why are black people often left with the burden of contextualizing how racism and stereotypes continue to exist and hurt us? Why do we believe that we have to be so damn strong, so damn resilient all the time? What would break if we let the dam loose, let the world know how we really feel?

Is it because if we are afraid that the world would aim to destroy us once more if we were honest?

The answer could be in afro-pessimism and what Frank B. Wilderson III describes in an interview:

Normally people are not radical, normally people are not moving against the system: normally people are just trying to live, to have a bit of romance and to feed their kids. And what people want is to be recognized, to be incorporated. And when we understand that recognition and incorporation are generically anti-Black, then we don’t typically pick up the gun and move against the system, even though that’s impossible. And I think that our language is symptomatic of that when we say that ‘I don’t like police brutality’. Because, here we are saying to the world, to our so-called ‘people of color allies’ and to the white progressives, ‘we’re not going to bring all the Black problems down on you today. If you could just help us with this little thing, I won’t tell you about the whole deal that is going on with us.’

*

What freaks them out about an analysis of anti-Blackness is that this applies to the category of the Human, which means that they have to be destroyed regardless of their performance, or of their morality, and that they occupy a place of power that is completely unethical, regardless of what they do. And they’re not going to do that. Because what are they trying to do? They’re trying to build a better world. What are we trying to do? We’re trying to destroy the world. Two irreconcilable projects.

Maybe self care starts with recognizing the disappointment I felt every time in the Philippines when I’d be informed that I was “the first black person” to frequent a particular business or area of the country. Not only was my mind mangled by trying to contextualize all of the racist/stereotyping attempts by people I’d met trying to get to know me, but I was also faced with the fact that, once again, I was one of few to explore in certain ways.

So I’ll say it again. I felt humiliated and as I sit here, I find it hard to come up with many reasons to go back for the foreseeable future. When I admit this, a deeper anxiety slips in that I refuse to really indulge. This anxiety says, “Well, if you’re a traveler and you’re black, does this mean you’ll never really find a home in the world? A place that gets what it’s like to be you?”

As for the answer to this question, I don’t know, but the hopeful part of me says that I need to keep searching on my own terms before I allow my already short life of 23 years to be marred by a belief that the world is wholly inaccessible to me, a black person that wants a world where different identities are respected, but never vital to someone’s value.

If I wanted to put these horrible realizations to deeper use, I would ask myself the question, “Well, what would I feel if I just went back? And got over it?”

Maybe I’d be attempting to actualize a stronger version of myself that can deal with being stared at all the time, asked if I play basketball and told I should put my sexuality (which is fetishized by white supremacy) to good use. That version of myself, I don’t think I would like very much. That version of myself would lessen the vulnerability that I feel is so integral to creating compelling art and embodying the kind of blackness that acknowledges the strength of who we are/what we are capable of while not stripping myself of the ability to feel pain, anxiety, anguish, and humiliation.

This vulnerable version of myself is what I believe is the ideal reality to struggle towards. One where walls and borders and barriers that are physical become as obsolete as the one in our minds, but maybe that reality is only possible with people like me (and hopefully you), who face the turmoil as it comes and uses it as a way to inform how we go into the world next time around.

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON FUTURE TRAVEL.

PRINCE SHAKUR

Pro-black, feminist, lover of locs and queer with restless feet.

Little White Girls Aren't the Problem with Voluntourism, Privilege Is.

“Isn’t race only an issue for those who make it one?” a British woman at Tourism Concern’s International Volunteering Conference asked. “Americans are, after all, obsessed with race,” she added. This wasn’t said as a compliment; it was posed with a hint of derision, as if our attempts at open dialogues on race are only one of a slew of problematic traits that she could point out. Now, I can’t say that we have the whole “talking about race” thing down in any way. Most of the time we suck at it, but while the questioner was wrong her query brought up a good point.

Race dynamics are an important factor in voluntourism, but they aren’t everything.

When it comes to the power dynamics of voluntourism, it is all about privilege. Privilege comes in a multitude of forms and is sometimes hard to identify. There is racial privilege, then there is economic privilege, educational privilege, geographic privilege, gender privilege, religious privilege, privilege that comes with adhering to heteronormative standards, skinny privilege, and a million more that have yet to be recognized or that I just do not know.

Privilege is, at its core, easy to identify but difficult to own up to. Those who experience it, myself included, struggle to openly recognize its existence as we hope beyond hope that our kind intentions and good will are enough to overcome it. But they aren’t. Intentions are not enough. The specter of privilege is unshakable and those who wish to deny it, those who say that race and other forms of privilege only matter when we bring them up, are naïve.

This is not to say that those who are privileged cannot do good work. Rather, their privilege, especially educational privilege, can be an asset in volunteering. Having a particular skill to offer can be priceless. Engineers can create solutions for regional water issues, doctors can train local physicians in new techniques, and educators can teach their local peers new styles resulting in better-educated students. Having specialized skills is awesome and often very helpful.

But privilege isn’t always an asset and often times in order to do aid right, volunteering shouldn’t even be a part of the equation.

This is specifically true for young would-be volunteers. Developing countries are, by and large, resource poor. One resource that they have more than enough of is unskilled labor. So why are we exporting unskilled labor to them by the millions?

To think that the only way to provide aid is to volunteer is to ignore the opportunities that exist for people to actively stimulate economies through ethical tourism. With voluntourism, those looking to volunteer carry their donations and privilege thousands of miles and an unbalanced give-and-take relationship is almost always inevitable. Accepting ones role as a tourist by supporting locally owned businesses is a form of stimulus sure to last much longer than a wall you spent three days painting in Honduras.

So this isn’t really about little white girls. It’s about everyone.

It’s about unrecognized privilege and it’s about an unequal exchange where volunteers benefit greatly and those who are meant to benefit rarely do so in a sustainable and long-term manner. More than anything, it’s about learning to help without having to hold the title of volunteer.

Travel as much as you possibly can. Experience cultures and get involved with communities, but do so in a way that economically invests in the places you care about and want to see made even better. Do this by staying in locally owned hotels, eating at locally owned restaurants, and frequenting locally owned businesses. Sometimes that means doing the hard work yourself, but there are some great companies and non-profits that are can do the work for you. Tourism Concern offers a number of options and Onwards started running trips in the spring.

Recognize privilege, open a dialogue, and accept that what you can offer comes with limitations.

Most importantly, don’t just volunteer in communities; invest in communities.

Quotes are paraphrased. 

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON PIPPABIDDLE.COM.

PIPPA BIDDLE

Pippa Biddle is a writer. Her work has been published by The New York Times online, Antillean Media Group, The FBomb, MTV, Elite Daily, Go Overseas, Matador Network, and more. She is a graduate of Columbia University with a degree in Creative Writing. Twitter: @PhilippaBiddle
 

I Was Called The N Word in The Philippines

It was only my second day in the Philippines and my Couchsurfing host invited me to watch a basketball game that he was playing in. Granted, the Philippines was a completely new country to me. I never thought that 2017 would bring me to Southeast Asia, but it has. In the Philippines, the heat makes you sweat relentlessly and you have to take numerous showers a day. Stray dogs and cats search for food in the streets, and trees are a beautiful invasion in the cities I’ve visited thus far. So much of it reminds me of my childhood visits to see family in Jamaica.

I head to the game around six pm and sit with my Couchsurfing host’s friend. It is only day two, but I’ve already become accustomed to one thing  here. People stare at me. A lot. I know it’s because I’m black and traveling. The questions are always the same when I meet a new person here.

Do you play basketball? Do you know Lebron James? Is your father tall, just like you? Do you have a girlfriend? 

Although traveling is about leaving your comfort zone, there is something to be said about how the identities that we are given in this world will affect us when abroad. I would never wish that I were white so that I could travel and feel more comfortable in this sense. I simply wish my representation in the media wasn’t controlled by people like who me and not white CEO’s.

The game starts and I notice little children gathering near me. They stare, whisper to one another and giggle before running away. After a few minutes, one little boy comes up to me and smiles.

“What’s your name?” he shouts.

I smile and tell him, “My name is Ryant. How old are you?”

He holds up seven fingers and then runs off. His friends greet him with an explosion of laughter. I am sure he will get the award for Bravest Boy in the Neighborhood later. Soon all of the kids are surrounding me, climbing onto my lap and asking questions. I’m invigorated by all of the energy, but I can’t help, but feel like a weird toy that one of them found and can’t wait to show off. More questions are fired off, an auction of how much information I can spit out. Then it happens.

“You’re a n----!”

My Couchsurfing host’s friend is sitting nearby and doesn’t bat any eyelash. On the outside, I nod awkwardly, but on the inside, I don’t quite know what to think. Since starting and graduating college, I’ve filled my mind with the words of many famous black freedom fighters. Angela Davis, a famous black activist born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1944 and who later faced an unfair trial for crimes she didn’t commit, wrote about the children she met while in Cuba:

Despite the language barrier, the children accepted us as members of the family. They helped me with my Spanish lessons each day. I was extremely embarrassed that I had not learned a little Spanish before the trip, for it is an affront to a people to visit them before having attempted to learn their language. Because I spoke Spanish so poorly, never having studied it, I felt less inhibited with the children. They were patient, corrected me and helped me find words when no dictionary was available. 

It was a sad day indeed when we had to pack up our things and board the bus, ready to move on to the next stage of our journey. All of us cried — men and women alike, in our delegation as well as on the Cuban side. The hardest part for me was saying good-bye to the children. A young boy of about nine or ten, who had always been the toughest one of his group, seemed reluctant to come up and say good-bye. I thought that it was his natural shyness. Just before I got into the bus, I went over to him and gave him a kiss on the cheek. He tore away from me and ran as fast as he could. But once in the bus, I saw him standing behind a tree, trying to conceal himself as his body shook with sobs. The tears that had been flooding my own eyes slid down my face. 

I think of her often when I can’t immediately find the words to respond to an ignorant comment from an acquaintance or when I need a push to live out my ideals for social justice. I’m looking at the faces of these cute Filipino kids and wondering how I can possibly unravel to them my life, my pain, and what it takes for a twenty two year old gay, Caribbean American boy to uproot his life and buy a one way ticket to Southeast Asia. 

I realize it’s impossible.

“You shouldn’t say that word,” I tell them. “In the United States, it’s very bad.”

Immediately the kids start to frown and look at each other in confusion.

“Why?” the first boy who ran up to me asks.

I tell them the basics. In the United States, black and brown people have been treated badly for a long time. That word was used by white people to make people that look like me feel bad.

“Oh… That word means gangster fighter in Tagalog.” the kid replies.

I laugh as the coach in the game blows the whistle on a foul. The serious part of me doesn’t want to laugh, but I can’t help it. One problem leads to another of a different shade I suppose. I can’t break down racial stereotypes to a group of elementary aged children just yet.

“Teach me some Tagalog.” I request.

They all giggle and teach me phrases. When the game is over, they pull me onto the court and beg me to shoot a basket. Inside I’m rolling my eyes and wishing this wasn’t happening this way, but my heart is still melting. They run around me, teach me how to dribble and all jump in excitement when I shoot a basket after a million tries.

On my walk home, they all ask to add me on Facebook and I am laughing more. I’ve accepted that these moments may be a reality wherever I go, but acceptance does not mean I won’t struggle towards a more loving way of life. Travel opens the eyelids, pumps blood into the heart and fills the body with moments of awe. I felt that awe as those kids stared at me with their curious eyes and interacted with me so openly. I knew that I could strive to do the same in return and attempt to shed light on confusing, yet present truths as well.

Yes, I was called the n-word in the Philippines, but I do not define myself by the rules that society sets for a black person, a traveler, or 22 year old who is just trying make sense of a messy world. Instead, I keep going forward with conviction, sure that I’ll speak up whenever is necessary along the way.

RYANT TAYLOR

Ryant Taylor is a writer and activist from Cleveland, Ohio. He has participated in protests in France, Ferguson, and Standing Rock. He is the creator of Decolonize The Mind, a travel blog, and is currently freelance writing in the Philippines.