What is Joke for Schoolboy is Death for Crapaud... (Racism should get no quarter in Trinidad & Tobago)

In trying to get better at this writing thing, I practice by taking other peoples writing apart to get a better feel for the flow. It has become a signature move, this 'deconstruction' and commenting, one that others are more than willing to assist with after the fact. Some writers, given more space, could have said so much more.

Here is a good example; Clarence Rambharat, University lecturer and lawyer took Government Ministers Jack Warner and Anil Roberts to task for the most degrading and disgusting behaviors aimed at an ethnic group to which they are a part. Couched in a self deprecating style, the two of them, seemingly high on their achievements and sure of their lofty positions have literally 'put God out of their thoughts' and reduced the lot of my African brothers and sisters (in the Parliament no less), showing clearly why fools should be left out of serious discussion if we ever hope to rise as one people.

Of ALL the gaffes made in this young session (and there have been many, some of them legendary), these are the worst because it is attempting to poke fun at others 'who look like we, but dem is not we. WE is suit and tie.)

Seriously?

The deconstruction:

"Anil Roberts's unsettling and unfunny "Tobago lips" comments seemed out of sync with his Government's multicultural agenda. Days after, occasional Prime Minister Jack Warner topped Roberts with an incredible self-description as the HNIC, an acronym whose "N" stands for the reviled "N word". These are weeds, innocuous weeds being sown, in what over time could get out of control in Kamla Persad-Bissessar's multicultural garden".

This opening paragraph grabbed me and kept me reading for the one two punch of clarity it delivered to a very touchy subject. His reference to 'innocuous weeds' is brilliant in its simplicity of description, and like tiny cracks that break stone over time, if the Prime Minister is not forced to stand up against these two and their utterings now, she may well come to be viewed as having said them herself.

"Fifteen years after Sumayyah Mohammed's hijab case shone the light on the word "tolerance" among the country's watchwords, Parliament's new breed of jesters seem prepared to use the self-deprecating style of comedy to get their kicks."

Abuse of privilege springs to mind.

"It's ironic that Roberts and Warner should select this time for their ethnic gigs. Roberts's Tobago lips piece and Warner's 'N' bomb were dropped in Parliament days after the French Senate voted overwhelmingly to impose penalties for burka-wearing, emphasising that intolerance can have unremarkable beginnings but unmistakable end results.

Trinis say "what is joke for schoolboy is death for crapaud". The fact is that even funny jokes can be hurtful, and these, left unpunished, can lead to stereotyping of a demeaning and discriminatory type. It is that stereotyping France is accused of engaging in today, in what is characterised, in some quarters, as growing "Islamophobia" and anti-immigrant sentiments.

Of course, France will take the punches for this one, but the rest of Europe and perhaps every major port of call for migrants is attentive. The Mighty Sparrow says 60 million Frenchmen can't be wrong and though it is not as much as 60 million, an IPSOS poll suggests that 57 per cent of France's 62 million population supports the burka ban and expulsion of Roma people".

His comparison to the French situation, while apt, may tend to lose the Trini reader in the turn. The fact is the numbers game that is racial politics in Trinidad & Tobago is what is in play here, and this subtle weakening of all things 'black' should not go unanswered.

Nothing undermines a man like an attack on his very identity, a trick the British crafted millennia ago to divide and rule and to establish the faulty notion that 'only white was all right'.

This is why I say it is time for Selwyn Cudjoe and others of his era to get out of the way, and let a more enlightened class of 'Black Leader' rise up and take the mantle. We as a nation absolutely need to celebrate our Africaness, our Indianess, our 'mixedupness' and every other race that makes us who we are.

Put another way, I am not black, but my Trini brother is black so I am black too. I am not Indian, but my Trini sister is Indian, so I am Indian too. We ARE each other like it or not, and moving to Florida and Canada does not change that for us.

The day Trinidadians and Tobagonians realize we are in fact one people with one multi racial, multi ethnic, mult religious identity, all bets will be off for the mind benders and mocking pretenders.

It is my dream that this happens in my lifetime.

Just like the French do not feel the need to explain their perceived intolerance, no one in Trinidad and Tobago took offence at Roberts's comments or saw it as a discussion which did not belong to the country's Parliament.

Similarly, Jack Warner's placement of the N word in the Hansard records may likely pass as a non-event, since it is Jack Warner after all and, as in the FIFA/Cabinet issue of duality, the view is that Warner and his so-called millions deserve more than the usual ethical legroom.

Total absolute and complete madness! It is BECAUSE they should know better they should hold themselves to a higher standard and lead people to a better place, not pull them down and degrade them. Warner by his statement weakened the hand of every one of my African brothers and this should not go unchallenged. Maybe insipidness and money are an unhealthy combination if given access to power.

Warner and Roberts are on the country's payroll and there must be a higher duty of care for the nation's top employees.

The events in France suggest that the religious and ethnic stakes are now moving higher and that even self-deprecation is not all that funny. Comments of the Anil Roberts and Jack Warner type are offensive and intolerable and can hurt, especially when they are made viral by television and other media coverage from the nation's Parliament.

Roberts's characterisation of his lips as big "because his father was Tobagonian", left the discerning to wonder about the appropriateness of those comments to any debate in the country's Parliament. Warner's language would have turned that wonder into anguish.

This is precisely why I have been agitating to have these two fools fired before they make things worse for my country. I have no say in Kamla Persad Bissessar's Administration, but if I did i would take her by the hand, look lovingly into her eyes and ask her if she is a racist. As I assume her answer to be no, I would then, still lovingly, suggest that she removes from her Cabinet and dismisses from her Government all who demonstrate racist and intolerance of any people. Market and rumshop behavior works well on Television everywhere as Jerry Springer and Spalk were both good examples of pandering to the lowest in society, but rumshop behavior has no place in Government.

Parliament is something else, and the lower House of Representatives is something else entirely. Their behavior is not representative of rank and file Trinidadians, and needs to be made an example of.

Roberts's and Warner's inappropriateness may of course be well timed. The Government has engaged a clip of spin doctors who may huddle around the Hansard records and fashion a response. Andy Johnson is an experienced hand.

He might find out, though, that it will take more than the wire-bending skills of Senor Gomez, the legendary city costume maker, to reshape the Anil Roberts salvo and the Warner N word into something of value for his boss's multicultural garden. The preferred course may be to forget this ever happened and hope that no weekly columnist makes a point of it.

That type of trash talk can be innocuous and maybe it is. Still, it leaves you feeling that Roberts and Warner may have slept through parts of the Prime Minister's Cabinet retreat, especially those dealing with conduct, respect and the nation's watchwords, especially tolerance. Or it may be that Roberts was just busy measuring lips in Tobago while Jack Warner practised dropping his N bombs.

Beautifully and succinctly put. 

I call on the Prime Minister to take firm and decisive action in these matters before they gain traction on the ground.

Race wars are easy to start and murder to end, doubles and pelau notwithstanding.  Too many people have too wide a swing on their racist pendulum; from wanting the Ganges to meet the Nile to making racially themed jokes that they would not make if the race being poked at were present. Why do this? Are we so weak that we cannot recognize ourselves for who we are racially and in turn, recognize our brothers and sisters?

A steel pan is not a tassa drum and a tassa drum is not a steel pan and thank God for the difference and the celebration they both bring. Our differences and our diversity define this nation, because as a whole the music we make is greater than the sum of our parts could ever be. Let us move away from hurting people for cheap political points, in the end nobody wins.

Something to think about...