Editor, Madam:
Metaphorically, rape is a forced and inhuman violent act against an individual or social group in which their human dignity is robbed, resulting in trauma manifested in certain mental illnesses and deviant behavior if they are not cured. Nervousness, outbursts of anger, and aggression are examples of traumatic behaviors.
European powers, traders and plantation owners historically raped our ancestors. They robbed him of the dignity of his ancestral surname, family, work, land, justice, political participation, decent education, housing and health.
Rebellion, resistance and reinterpretation were concrete responses to a traumatized life during slavery and the colonial, post-colonial and independence eras. Unfortunately, unresolved trauma is passed down from generation to generation.
I watched in horror a Facebook video of a Jamaican man in an immigration holding room at Mexico’s Cancun International Airport violently tearing up the place. When unresolved historical trauma collides with contemporary trauma due to social injustice, real or perceived, it causes anger and violence.
Caribbean societies have been deeply scarred by ongoing physical, psychological and mental abuse. Events in our post-independence Caribbean continue to traumatize us and remain unresolved.
If it was the suppression of black power movements (1970s); The Grenada Revolution and the American Occupation (1983); the assassination of Guyanese historian, political activist and academic Walter Rodney (1980); the oppressive regime of the Duvalier family (Haiti); numerous hurricanes; The effort of Abu Bakr rebellion in Trinidad and Tobago (1990); The Green Bay Massacre in Jamaica (1978); the attack on the Catholic congregation at the Cathedral of Saint Lucia (2000); incursions of Tivoli Gardens in Jamaica (2010); and now increased school violence across the Caribbean – our societies face additional trauma from violent crime.
According to data from the World Population Review, three Caribbean countries are among the top ten countries with the highest crime rates – Trinidad and Tobago (six), Guyana (seven) and Jamaica (10).
The COVID-19 pandemic was another cause of trauma.
Upon the Jamaican’s return to Mexico weeks later, he was as cool as a cucumber during a Gleaner Jamaica interview, even after allegations of abuse by Mexican authorities. His approach is emblematic of how Caribbean societies deal with trauma. We bury it and move on.
The development of Caribbean societies rests largely on their mental health. All economic benefits are sustainable only if there is a mentally healthy society. In dealing with endemic trauma, the challenge for governments is to use educational, cultural and health systems as tools to heal our historical and current trauma.
FR DONALD CHAMBERS, JP.
