Spitting matches are counter productive

In a letter to the editor, some years ago, appearing over the name of one David Mason of La Romaine, the writer complained that, “the political analysts, journalists and misguided politicians seem hell-bent on perpetuating the categories of ‘Indo’ and ‘Afro-Trinidadians.” Mr Mason asked “Why are they continuing to slavishly ape our North American brothers who are far more deprived than us?” He continued, “I have never heard of an Indo-Guyanese or a Chino-Jamaican actually Sino-Jamaican or an Afro-Barbadian. Something must be done to outlaw these odious terms ‘Afro’ and ‘Indo’ in our society. How will we categorise our growing numbers of beautiful douglas? One political leader referred to “the blacks and the browns.” I’m not sure how this “Classification” was arrived at. But the minds of politicians (and political analysts) move in mysterious ways.

Well, fasten your belt Mr Mason and “doh dig nutten” because some “experts” simply have to assign you to one of the “tribes” and/or “ethnicities.” Calpysonian, Mighty Dougla, whose calypso sobriquet depicted his ethnic mix must have been having fun at the Dougla’s expense in his calypso when he indicated that he would be “in a monkey pants,” if, all of a sudden, “they” decided to send Indians back to India and Africans back to Africa. He’s neither one, nor the other — half of one and half of the other. It’s been a long time since the dougla nomenclature carried a pejorative meaning. The douglas, if he/ she chooses, can refer to him/herself as “an Afro-Indo-Trini or an Indo-Afro Trini.” Tribal “classification” would probably have to keep in step with ethnic miscegenation. Now matters could get very rough if we have to classify OJ Simpson, “Someone who used to be Prince” and Michael Jackson. I suppose that I could assist in the “classification.” But only one little problem. Can’t find my “court clothes” and have lost contact with my lawyer.

Dr Eric Williams (that bloomin’ fellow again) has been portrayed as something of an “African tribal chieftain.” One of the best kept secrets is that Williams was of French Creole and dougla stock. The Black Power crowd and some self-anointed “analysts” sought to pin the “Afro-Saxon” label on him and the likes of Sir Arthur Lewis. Williams, typically, ignored them. And Lewis surmised that if the “label” meant anything it’s that he could compete with “the best at the international level.” I suppose that we remember Dr Williams for some of his public statements. How many of us remember Dr Williams telling us that we have only one “mother” — mother Trinidad and Tobago, no matter how many grandmothers we might have. Remember when Williams declared that he had banned the N-word and the C-word?

Some might go further and question whether we stand a ghost of a chance building a coherent society with its own distinct national identity, commanding general loyalty, when you have each group branching off on its own, searching for its roots. Some might even wonder whether people are retreating into cultural cul-de-sacs. One apparently irate caller to a radio call-in programme seemed irked by both the Indian Arrival Day and the African Emancipation Day enthusiasts and blurted out, “All of a sudden, we have so many Africans this and Indians that. Why the hell don’t we have citizens of TT and call that “George.” My own guess is that if we could keep off the grimy paws of the politicians, and self-serving self-publicists, we’d be spared much of the bacchanal and toxicity of so-called “discourse.” “Sticks and stones can break my bones but words can never hurt me.” As we know, politicians, especially rabble-rousers, can, conceivably, have deleterious effects, especially if one seeks to exploit the baser instincts of the human animal.

It appears that, like the political leaders, I tend to occupy my own parallel universe at the deep end of the pond. How else do you explain that I do not feel the tension and observe the general antipathy associated with “polarisation,” the much-heralded “polarisation.” What I’ve noticed is that people are generally fed up to the back teeth, with politicians who haven’t the faintest idea of how to manage the “ship of state” without steering clear of “the criminalisation of politics on the one hand and the politicisation of criminality on the other.” We’ve probably not reached the Jamaican stage as yet where Mafia-type Godfathers (Dons) are publicly eulogised by the political leaders. To return to the fissiparous tendencies, the answer could be unity in diversity, and uniqueness in identity could manifest the confluence of the metaphorical rivers.

One Mr Guichard, a leader of one of the groups promoting activities connected with Emancipation anniversary celebrations, admitted that the different “African groups” were, by no means, diverse or antagonistic towards each other, but had the common objective of developing the black community within the context of the cosmopolitan society of TT. Admittedly, there are detractors who see the search for black identity as racism in disguise. It is even felt, in certain quarters, that the leaders of both the Afros and the Indos are simply being manipulative to further their own ends. It would, in my view, be a terrible mistake if all the”tribes” and political so-called “ethnicities” do not treat with their concerns, grievances (real or imagined) and talk to and not at or past each other. The mutual shouting and spitting matches are only likely to be counter-productive. Now what, in my view, is required is not that our Prime Minister be Indian, African or whatever, but that he/she enjoys public trust and cross-ethnic appeal across the board.