Survival strategies of an anti-racist, racial mixed Hindu coolie man in Guyana 2020

"... your silence will not protect you.. "  Audre Lorde 

"One who is equal to friends and enemies, who is equiposed in honor and dishonor, heat and cold, happiness and distress, fame and infamy, who is always free from contamination, always silent and satisfied with anything, who doesn't care for any residence, who is fixed in knowledge and engaged in devotional service, is very dear to Me." Bhagvad Gita, Chapter 12 V 18-19

"“In order to rise from its own ashes, a Phoenix first must burn.." Octavia E Butler, Parable of the Sower



Mixed, coolie
"Man Vidya, you aint easy" the 2012 census enumerator tells me after I tell her to put Mixed for me on the census form after indicating my parents are both "East Indian".

I use the word 'coolie'. I know it is loaded with hate , contempt, used to enforce division.

But black and coolie when talking about Guyana's 'major ethnic groups' is easier for me to use than 'African' and 'Indian' to do as I have used the words 'Black' and 'Coolie' to build bridges or strengthen connecting spaces between us when bridges are not possible

"Mixed" as I think of indigenous concepts of land without boundaries, that my
ways of living, loving, speaking, eating , thinking, moving have been influenced by indigenous peoples; descendants of enslaved Africans; descendants of Chinese, African and Portuguese indentured immigrants.

 And from conforming to, resisting British White oppression and from decolonising.
 
I mean Racial as I consciously or sub-consciously look at how race plays out. The instinct when walking in a room or look at a group picture  and  after counting number of men and women, and who nice looking  and who not so nice looking, as to the different races.

Even though I know, that in many settings, that my head is not represented by someone who looks like me , and is better represented than someone who don't look like me.

And Racial in looking sometimes at how I might be the only coolie in a group of non-coolie for many things which should have 'diverse representation'. But that is why I might be mixed in my head.

That I don't look only for when there is an absence of coolie people and dominance of non-coolie people - or black people, that I look too to see see when there is a dominance of coolie people and the absence of black people.

Racial in understanding why those presences and absences exist, and in working in understanding how to even them out which is not about perpetuating racist agendas which can be used to enable power and greed, rather than equality.

And that when people tell me 'that I not like dem who xyz' , I must also think of the times when I think 'but you not like dem rest, dat you is not like other black people who xyz"


Anti-racist in understanding histories of discrimination, of how prejudice festers, of challenging oppression. And of listening to stories.  And telling stories.


And that understanding the stories are mixed with perceptions, belief, often contrary to evidence and data or presented with data.

Anti-racist in moving beyond the stories to try to imagine new ones, design new ones which are not about whether the old stories are true or not because each teller of the story has their truth.

And understanding that that even if there is no unconditional acceptance of truths, that collective truths can be created.

Can we build new collective truths even if  we accept that each other has their truth - even if  we don't accept those truths .. black, coolie, Indigneous, other.. ?


Anti-racist  in insisting that one person's racist ranting should be addressed not only with lengthy epistles, some scholarly, of how the whole group is racist, and that is how 'dem stay' , but also with the stories and rantings of the times when people connect, that even when race is known and seen, that people connect. 


Guyana
In surviving , I do not believe or celebrate a 54 year old Independent Guyana or 50th Republic.  I resist these ideas of sovereignty and independence which lock us into prisons..

I believe Guyana is hundreds, thousands of years old. The land existed long before humans came.

The boundaries were created by people who thought they could own other human beings, exploit them.

I am no patriot as I have no interest in shouting 'my Guyana' when Guyana is this land space in this time where I am located and so I share this inter-dependent relationship with the land space, with other living beings, including humans who are not going to think like I do and might even want me to leave.

So instead of independence, Inter-dependence now, is more important for me.

Inter-dependent on each other, inter dependent with the environment.

That inter-dependence does not see boundaries.


Hindu
Idol worshipper, demonic is how some of my fellow humans think of Hinduism. And they express it outright, while for many black, coolie, Indigenous, other people , Hindu celebrations are normal, to be part of life, for many they are signs of devil, evil. And I listen to the justifications of the racist righteousness. Subtle ways, not so subtle ways. Open ways.

And some are stated plainly as doctrine, some are spoken quietly.  The Satanising though is not only religion , race.. I am Satan too according to the Bible Study on the Jehovah Witness website, advocating for LGBT equality is advocating for sexual immorality, and for others who have said so.

But in this knowing and seeing, in keeping in mind the Gita's  mandate, equality in the friend and the foe, that in seeing and understanding, in that knowing that those who think I am demonic or satanic, that I do not think of them that way.

And that as they would aim to destroy Satan and chase Satan out, I would rather welcome them in, righteous prejudice and all. Well some of them anyway.




Black lives matter
Listening, reading, the outrage. The systemic racism in the USA, the state violence against African-Americans. Black Lives Matter.  I do not get into the conversations about burning and looting and violent and non-violent protests. 

I remember thinking when the protesters wanted to take over the Office of the President in July 2002, that's okay.. go ahead.  The Office of the President should be yours too. In those days, the fence was mesh and so, gate not so high. 

Now with the Green fence, it would be more difficult to take over the premises

But it was not okay to go on Regent Street to loot businesses.


I am reading the outrage of Guyanese connecting to the rage in the USA. I am listening as the connections come to this space.  The oppressor in the USA

Are coolie people responsible for the systemic violence against black people in Guyana? Is raging against anti-black violence in Guyana, raging against coolie people - regardless of their poverty, their lack of political influence beyond the ballot?
  
State violence is not a police thing only. People have died in the health system, preventable deaths which are never investigated. No accountability. And the never ending cliche in the justice system, that the poor - regardless of ethnic origins - are going to be denied justice more than the rich and politically connected.

I condemn the racism and the State violence against black people in the USA.

I condemn State violence in Guyana. I condemn the violence any protestor in Guyana who feels that attacking other citizens is an assertion of their rights.

Thinking of elections and protests and the violence of some of the elections protests in the last 25 years or so, wondering.. police shoot pellets. That there are black bodies and coolie bodies now walking around with pellets and scars from pellets, from calling for their votes to be counted.

What kind of conversation with the owners of these pellet ridden bodies have, if they had to talk to each other about how to deal with pellet scars and pellets in the body?



Loving and not loving the PNC; Loving and not loving the PPP
Mixed, coolie man. Not voting to avoid getting into the African vs East Indian madness.About who more racist than who

But thinking - like the woman who has voted PPP all her life until she stopped voting .. who said no.. not this PPP, not this version ., not this madness . it would have been good if somebody else win..
 
but then, watching in horror as the PNC starts accusing innocent people of voter fraud, of their names being used for voting when they are out of the country,

Of the young voter, telling me ' I am disappointed in these people, how could think they I would be involved in this.. I am afraid to say anything..' 

 That the fear of the State under PPP exists still, as the fear of the State under the PNC .. another young man, black man, telling me he wouldn't write the letter he wants to write because he has already been under attack by PNC colleagues for being critical.

Survival though as the limbo of mixed, coolie.. trying to move like some jumbie in some unknown space which is beyond the PNC and the PPP, loving both of them because loving is better than fearing or hating, but not loving them too as loving means nurturing and growing and I have no interest in this 2020, to nurture any of the madness of the PNC or the PPP.

Because the Hindu scriptures tell me I am one with the PNC and the PPP, there is no difference.




Getting involved

"Vidya, get involved.  Your generation has to  salvage this country.  Mine screwed it up thoroughly and soon thank God there wont be any  of us left.  You guys are the only hope and you can do it"

May 2020. I see the message. The man, I know, I thought, supporter of the Coalition Government, supporter of Guyana. Man who has voted differently from me. Black man.  

I feel a sense of loss. I talk to another elder, a woman who feels the same now, deep sense of loss .. feeling this same jumbie space of neither the PPP, nor the PNC, of loss of hope after 2015 did not pan out .  

Getting involved, how though?

Can I pre-empt some burning and looting?

Burning out the prejudices, burning out the oil and its fake promises of prosperity, burning out the Constitution with its winner take all, burning out the desperation for power

Looting some hope that instead of believing in politicians and corporations, that people believe in ourselves and each other even ?

Can I light some fires which destroy some of the black coolie myths and stereotypes,  which destroy the lack of accountability in our state systems, our own individual lack of accountability?
Looting instead the moments of solidarity (as I witnessed today a multi-racial, multi-political group seeking to repair an injustice the health system), looting collective dreams and aspirations, owning them and developing them?


Survival for me is knowing ,  in these ashes of Guyana, that the Phoenix is black, coolie, Indigenous, mixed, PNC, PPP,  all breathing at the same time ,  removing the strangle holds.

And in knowing there is nothing I can do about it except to embrace anyone who wants to strangle me. And to not strangle anyone else.

And  Breathing with those who will breathe with me. (Thanks Carlotta )