Gays in Recent Jamaican News

For better or for worse, the issue of gays, their lifestyle and rights in Jamaica has become a regular part of the weekly news cycle.

Just about every week, it seem, brings another report of either the results of an investigation, or an attack from a pastor, a family member or a mob.

Today's Jamaica Observer brought a headline article entitled Inside a Gay Church.

Last week there was an article, again in the Observer, that showed an alleged cross-dresser being beaten by a mob -- with the above picture being included.

I remember an earlier post I wrote on the issue of homosexual hatred in Jamaica, to which reader responded by saying that I was exaggerating the existence of this sentiment. While the extent of this hatred might be open to question, the fact that it is real is tough to argue with.

While mob violence is still an ongoing problem in Jamaica -- for alleged thieves and other criminals -- there have been very few prosecuted for the crime.

I understand that the people pictured above, however (who happen to be women) are in fact being charged with a crime -- which is a first... that I can remember.

It is said that an idea whose time has come is first ignored, then violently opposed, and then quietly accepted as a norm. Maybe we are in the second stage of a major change?

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Tolerance and Talent

Generally, university campuses around the world are seen as leaders in bringing enlightened thinking to the forefront of a country or community's consciousness. They are seen as sources of new ideas, energy and ideals that lead nations to new levels of prosperity.

If Richard Florida's research on the Creative Class and today's Jamaica Observer and Gleaner are to be believed, then our Jamaica will have to overcome some major hurdles in order to reach the economic heights that we desire.

The headlines read as follows: Cops rescue alleged homo from UWI students and Alleged homosexual attacked at UWI.

Apparently, the police had to fire shots to stop the beating that a student was receiving from his peers after he allegedly propositioned another student on UWI's Mona campus. The details can be found at the two links listed above.

The thoughts that went through my head were first off, a mix of condemnation and blame. I immediately started to curse the perpetrators of the gang violence, and hoped that _very_ bad things would happen to them while they served their respective prison sentences.

After that, I felt sorry for the student who was beaten, and scared for his future at UWI. Can he ever return? Will this be a turning point for him (whether he is truly gay or not) that will forever limit his freedom and self-expression?

Then I felt ashamed, and hoped that I would not be reading about this incident in the LA Times, New York Times and Washington Post, as further examples of the violence that we Jamaicans are capable of, even in our institutions of "higher learning."

Then, after I sat with it for a while, I felt a deep kind of sadness, because I recalled my own reaction to what I thought might have been a proposition (as shared in an earlier entry in this blog entitled "An Ugly Reaction.") It is clear to me, that I could have found myself in that mob at an earlier age.

Why?

Because I still carry around the capacity to hate homosexuals at the level that those UWI students do. It was evident in my response to that phone call that prompted the blog. Even though I am committed to not harbouring or expressing or acting on this hate, I have blogged publicly that it is there.

I mean... would I have called for a good beating if I had been the one approached?

Would I have stood by while they chased him down? Would I have asked the security guards and policemen to hand him over so that I, and others, could finish him off? Would I have had to courage to stop the incident, as one fellow tried and failed to do?

The fact is, I can see myself in that mob, to some degree. The fear, anger, hatred and deep self-righteousness.

Thankfully, it doesn't end there. One the other side of the fear (which seems the deepest of all these dark emotions) I actually see hope.

Why????

I have no idea.

But it is there -- just beyond the darkest part of the fear. Maybe I'll be able to clearly answer the "Why?" at some point.

At the moment, however, I'm just working on showing some tolerance for those students who attacked that fellow. After all, they are our most talented.

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Accepting Shocking News

In the Gleaner yesterday, and also on television, there was a story about three men being killed for stealing a goat in Westmoreland.

Or to be more accurate, they were lynched.

Apparently, they were in the process of stealing a goat, when their plans were waylaid by people in the district who spotted the stolen goat in an abandoned building. They decide to wait for the men, and when they arrived, they attacked them en masse with machetes, and probably anything else they could get their hands on.

I imagine that many went to church the following morning, and are probably justifying their attack to themselves and those around them. After all:
-- these men should have known what was coming
-- this is someone's livelihood that was being affected by the theft
-- the Bible says "...."

And the chances that it will happen again are quite high, as a search of the Gleaner archives reveals that this kind of mob action happens every few months or so. I have mentioned a few prior incidents in my blog a few times.

I doubt that anyone will be persecuted either.

Living in Jamaica has taught me how to accept shocking news, and how to move on with life in spite of it. This might just be an essential skill for anyone coming to live in Jamaica...

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An Attack in a Soca Party

Given how soon this comes after the lynch mob in Half-Way Tree threatened to beat up two alleged gay men, I am a bit dumbstruck.

So, no comment...

Other than to say that the story made the headlines in the Observer and the Star, perhaps saying something about our appetite for this kind of story.

Anti-gay attack
Men chased, beaten after MoBay carnival stage display

Click here to read the article

P.S. This was followed by an attack on a church funeral of an allegedly gay man. See the story here. And another account here.

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Oh what a difference a month makes.

The move is not quite completed, but I look back to what I wrote back then can only marvel at my naivete, and lack of knowledge.

The one thing that I most regret is that there is no source on the internet that right now has any practical help on how to arrange a move back to Jamaica (or any third world country I imagine.) Hopefully this can help anyone how is looking for advice, and hopefully they will actually be able to find it!

There have been constant surprises all along the way, and I've learned a lot about a process I hope never to repeat -- but not because the process is difficult, but because I don't want to ever leave Jamaica to live anywhere else ever again!

The first major surprise came when the twenty foot container arrived.

I had thought that the container was something like the PODS (Portable On Demand Storage Units) I'd seen in people's driveways -- a clean, white metal box that would occupy a single parking space. In fact, on Thursday morning I went cycling in the morning and saw a couple of PODS in the neighborhood... "No problem, I thought."

That was until I saw the huge, metal rusty box arrive at my Emerald Place apartment in Fort Lauderdale ar atound 1 pm or so. It was bigger than I thought, and nowhere near as photogenic as the PODS I'd seen. In fact, it kinda looked like a dumpster on a flat bed carrier, raised about 5 feet off the ground being pulled by a driver (who spoke a little English, thankfully) and his son who was no more than 10 years old.

He quite innocently asked me where I wanted to place the container, and I thought to myself - oh, that's easy -- near to the front of the building, near the elevators. So he pulled it in, sideways, backing it in with his semi, and walked to the back and released the container.

Except, it seemed that he had forgotten to take the carrier with him...

So as he prepares to pull away, my wife and I look at each other in a panic and say "Hold on, is he leaving it like that???"

Well, apparently he was.

There was the container, on a carrier, sitting 5 feet above the ground, in the parking lot of my apartment complex... looking as if it had no business being there parked between apartment 304's Camry and apartment 106's scooter.

Also, we looked at each other and asked "How the heck to we get up that high?" At five feet off the ground, there was no way to get ourselves up that high... not without major gymnastics, a ramp or a lot more help than "Raggedy Rich" and "Dutty Dawg Dacres", my two friends who were coming to help us move. How in the world were we going to get our belongings from my apartment and up and into that thing?

While the driver waited for our next move (he clearly had some a lunch of hot empanadas waiting somewhere for him and his son) a man walks up and asked accusingly "What the heck is that and how long is it going to be there?" I've never seen him before...

I try to explain the situation, throwing in the fact that I was moving back home to Jamaica, and needed to do this to export my belongings. Maybe, I thought, he'd take some pity on poor us and what we were trying to do.

"Four days???!!!! Hell no. This is private property! You can't leave that there! I'm calling the apartment complex, and the fire marshall ,and the police and the coast guard, and...." I don't know what he said next, because I had stopped listening by then as he ranted on, giving me an instant reminder of some of the things I dislike about America.

We ignored him, but realized that we'd better get some permission from the apartment complex before the driver left. With our best hand signals, my wife ran and stopped him, and tried to explain to him using both of the words that she knew in Spanish, that we needed to get permission from the apartment complex to leave the (possibly) offending object in place, which was now taking up 6 parking spaces in the front of building 3, Emerald Place.

He seemed to understand, and she begged him for 15 minutes (his son did some fast interpreting.)

We quickly went over to the office in the hope of warding off a barrage of phone calls from what I thought could quickly turn into a lynch mob, and (too quickly, and out of breath) explained the situation to one of the employees in the apartment office.

She assured us that the office manager would NEVER allow us to leave it where we had.

We gulped.

But, credit to her clear thinking, she called her boss and asked if we could leave it at the back of the complex (about 300 yards away), and if we could get 24 hours to get it off the property. She was very persuasive, which might have had something to do with our panicked looks and generally desperate demeanor.

Her boss relented, and after a quick call to the container company to see if they could pick the container up the following day (Friday) instead of Monday, we at least were now allowed to theoretically pack this 20 foot metal box with all our earthly possessions.

Now... how the heck would we get all those earthly possessions from my second floor apartment, and nice two bedroom with a view of the pool, incidentally, down to the rusty container sitting atop a carried over five feet high, 300 yards away?

Somehow, "Raggedy Rich" and "Dutty Dawg Dacres" didn't seem like the right help for us at 2 pm on Thursday and the clock ticking.

(to be continued)

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