Agitations intensify over what happened to many George Floyds

Jun 15, 2020 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,
Today, I go where even the gods fear to tread, by publicly saying what is left unsaid. I use the George Floyd tragedy as foundation and launchpad.
The traumas from the death of this once unknown black American, now a global monument to the brutal injustices of the state, need no repetition.
It the final solution of those states that empower its agents to deliver unequivocal messages to downtrodden groups of people. I am not fooled by the sanctimonies rushing in torrents from many quarters; I recognize them, and watch guardedly, for I know.
Those of us, who struggled and overachieved, and have been repeat victims of corporate white-
collar atrocities, lived with injuries that hurt.
By this I mean, those of us who were overlooked and bypassed, tripped up and run over, with smile and apology know a different kind of battering. So, we discern the damage control efforts at work, the covering of tracks in well-tended retreat.
Time will reveal what is real, what is convenient. Today, agitations intensify over what happened to many George Floyds; the piercing reactions abound of many who say:
‘I can’t breathe.’ There is the sharpest intake of protective breath, for it could be anybody. Today, the fears and the agonies are localized, when Black Guyanese say, ‘I can’t breathe.’
I hear that, and I acknowledge the associated sharp anxieties that pervade black positions and visions of where they stand in Guyana in this most upheaving of elections in this country. It is that they and Black Guyana can’t breathe when perceived electoral injustices place knee on the neck.
I think that all of this has found a home in many hearts. For to disagree would be to deny the strength of settled convictions, to squeeze the wound while it is still open and raw. In this society, no one forgets matters with a political flavour.
Hence, the message is that Black Guyanese can’t breathe, and larger Guyana can’t breathe. And that the sensation and despair that comes from ‘I can’t breathe’ is heavily related to the way of our elections process has unfolded and now stands starkly, almost conclusively.
Of course, conclusively, depends on which side of the story is given greater credence, which one will prevail beyond the end, as in the unpromising aftermath.
Now, I use all the above to add another layer to the messages, narratives, and positions that have raged and dominated.
I articulate that Indo-Guyanese register the same fears of the present and for the future, like Black Guyanese.
I voice that Indians have the same convictions of past tribulations as lived by Black Guyanese, and as they (Indians) themselves did live, too. And I share that Indians exist in dread of the same agonies that horrify Black Guyanese, which come from the trepidations, the specter, of a knee on the neck and the overpowering blankness that comes from ‘I can’t breathe.’
I say all of this not as an Indianist, since I am not; nor on behalf of Black Guyanese, of which I will not pretend to be. I say this as someone, who speaks to a country suffocating and hurting grievously, but which insists on the freedom to cut off its own oxygen.
At present, Black Guyanese fear that they have been the victims of many a knee on their necks, when the compressing weight of illegal ballots squeeze the breath out of their prospects.
And by the same token, Indo-Guyanese harbour premonitions of the pressure that chokes the breath out of their chances to rise from the ground to which they have been pinned.
Another contention not uttered is that when one says ‘I can’t breathe’ it is the knee of theother that is seen as responsible. In the instances of both Black and Indian Guyanese, there is the belief that their plaintive cries are not being heard nor acted upon, and that relief does not come. Instead, their spirits are carted away in ambulances and their futures end up being buried in unmarked graves.
For such is the fate of losers: it is winners who write histories where the poignant ring of “I can’t breathe” does not feature. It is where we are across this tortured green sward.
Now, I leave with this: whichever way this offering of mine is interpreted or misinterpreted, accepted or rejected, finds traction or fails to find footing, something stands incontestable: given where we are, what we have been, it is all Guyana, black and brown and the rest of its encircling rainbow that can’t breathe. Knees of one on the necks of the other, and pressing the life out.
Sincerely,
GHK Lall

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News