Stuff from around the region

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This post and its comments raise some interesting questions about Bermudian homophobia that could be floated here as well. (A Limey in Bermuda)Barbados makes plans to process and manufacture Sea Island cotton. (My Barbados Blog)Guyana-Gyal meditates on family and emigration. (Guyana)The Bajan Deputy Prime Minister calls for regulation of blogs and call-in shows. (The Nation)Barbados Free Press, an online newsblog, reacts to the DPM's comments. (Barbados Free Press)

Why blog? To know what freedom is

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And to know what it isn't.On Global Voices, a lengthy translation of a Chinese blog is featured.  The purpose:  to point out the lack of freedom that still exists in China, where the state has the power to intimidate and uses it, even (or especially) to the point of attempting to silence legitimate questions being raised about AIDS infections.An excerpt:

June 20My first time to be tailed by twelve people in three carsAt home after work I was puzzled. Half thinking about what to cook, half thinking why on earth I was kept under house arrest yesterday. All day today I was followed by two to three cars and about eight to twelve people.Who am I? I pondered, half washing vegetables, half thinking. I’m a newly-wed housewife. I’m twenty-two years old. Height just falls short of 160 centimeters and weight just below 45 kilograms. My appearance is nother pretty nor ugly, my face is pale. I like kids, that’s why I volunteer in the AIDS village helping to raise over two hundred orphans. I love writing, and every day pour my heart on onto my blog. Until my husband disappeared, then instead of biting my nails I started writing the facts and not emotions. Weak and sickly, post-meningitis leftover problems often make me forget people and things. Because of this I can’t do anything with out my hands, some paper and a pen. Thoughts are simple, temper is stubborn, tend not to see the big fish eating the small fish, or people taking advantage of other people, often cry when feeling incompetent.What did I do? Every day I go to work at the company and earn my rice bowl. Every day I volunteer for the AIDS work organization. Every day I write in my blog and express my state of mind. I rush about weeping trying to get my missing husband back. On the eighteenth I was announced as the Victims’ Family Members Award. Hearing Chen Guangcheng’s wife voice and news on the telephone, I can’t take it and quietly start to cry.Yesterday morning just after six a.m. Hu Jia left home, planning to go to the hospital in the morning to get some medicine and in the afternoon go to the ‘The Blind man Chen Guangcheng Incident’ press conference. At seven I gave him a phone call and learned that he was still down below in the courtyard, arguing with two dozen-odd built guys. I went downstairs only to see that they were the Beijing central and plainclothed Tongzhou district State Secrecy Bureau [SSB] detachments. Among them were those who took part in kidnapping Hu Jia for forty-one days, police responsible for the small community police station as well as some faces I didn’t recognize at all. These secret police circled around Hu Jia, trapping him in, and closed the iron gate to the outer yard. Not only did they violently stop Hu Jia from leaving, they also forbid me from leaving. Early that morning the neighbors heard a loud ruckus, and slowly came from all over to crowd around and watch. One of the SSB guys said, “no matter what happens, the two of you cannot go out today.” What kind of reasoning is this? No legal documents, no displaying of credentials, just the lone one-liner, “the two of you cannot go out today” can deprive us of our freedoms? Previously, even when Hu Jia was under house arrest and then later missing, I had never been put under house arrest. Why? I demand an answer but the SSB guy pretended he didn’t know, just spat out some mumb-jumbo. I phoned some friends, and they all said the friends and lawyers who were supposed to be at the Chen Guangcheng Incident press conference were under similar conditions, being held against their will all over town, forcing the press conference to be called off. But Hu Jia was out of medicine, prescribed by the doctor such that it could only be gotten at the hospital. After fighting for over hours, we refused to leave the courtyard. Neighbors far away could all hear the arguing. Seeing that we weren’t willing to budge, the SSB guys made some phone calls to their superiors and in the end had no choice but to take Hu Jia to the hospital to fulfill his prescription, but only on the condition that I stay at home. Hu Jia had to be taken in an SSB detachment police car, and a few SSB people in a few other cars followed him there, rushing him back home as soon as his prescription was filled and not allowing him any contact with the outside world.This morning when I went downstairs to go to work, I noticed a car following me closely, all the way to the office. No matter where I went, there were earpiece-wearing people watching. At lunch I stepped out of the office only to notice there was one more car following me now. To put it another way, there were twelve people in three cars tailing me. Of these twelve there were men and women, all of whom were taller, stronger and older than me. One modern white car’s license plate number was 京F B8233, one license plate in front but none in the back. One grey Mazda with a front license plate number 京F E6034, but the rear license plate was not clear. One deep gray Japanese Bluebird car with the number 京F C9288 in the front and 京E 09288 in the back. I phoned a friend, he asked if I was scared. Not scared, I said, just quite anxious.***Sitting in front of the computer, breathing deeply, calming myself down. What are they afraid of? Why would they be afraid of a powerless girl? Things have been so abnormal recently! My husband was kidnapped by the police for forty-one days, something until today nobody has taken responsibility for. Big, solemn Shandong province. Not only is it afraid of a blind man, it’s also afraid of his bare-handed wife, kidnapping, beating and putting them under house arrest, dragging the weak young new mother away along the ground. Now they seek to harm this blind man with a fake accusation and send him to prison. The most abnormal is how jittery the great capitol Beijing has gotten just over the telling of a blind man’s encounters. The city wide illegal obstruction of people’s personal freedoms is the most ironic. Of the friends put under house arrest, half of them are outstanding Beijing lawyers, more than a few of whom have PhDs in law. So who is there still able to safeguard the sanctity of the law? The most absurd part is that as those friends whose personal freedom was illegally constricted regained their freedom, in a random spot on Beijing’s east side are twelve people and three cars following closely a young, weak woman. Are they so scared of a woman not yet even twenty-three years old?Since 2004 my husband, Hu Jia, has experienced being tailed, put under house arrest, beaten and kidnapped countless times. But today is the first time they’ve targetted me with restrictions and tailing, which I think is very disgusting. To be disgusted is the instinctual reaction any woman would have in these circumstances. Try and think. No matter where I go there are always pot-bellied men wearing earpieces following closely and eavesdropping, taking cameras and video cameras and sneakily filming me, watching me with sleazy gazes as they phone back to make reports. Even when I’m in public toilets they look in the direction of the toilet to see ‘what conspiracy I’m up to.’ When I go home, they park below my balcony. If I don’t close the curtains, they watch everything I do. This is what I mean by disgusting.This behavior of theirs makes me feel ashamed. Every month I work my butt off for less than 2000 yuan in wages, and I still have to pay taxes to the government. But this money is actually used to support a group of tall sturdy guys in tailing and surveilling every movement and action of small, weak people like me. How much are twelve people’s wages? How much for twenty-four hour surveillance and overtime pay? How much is the gas for three cars? Even more so, how many resources are being consumed to keep the air conditioning in their police cars running non-stop on these hot days? How much does it cost for the cameras, video cameras and listening devices used to spy on me? And the mobile phone charges? I don’t dare go on thinking. I feel ashamed for my country. I also feel sorry for myself, using my taxpayer’s money to support components in the state apparatus in monitoring the weak.I don’t know what will happen tomorrow. Many friends why they can’t open my blog. I also cannot open my own blog. My husband Hu Jia forces a smile and says ‘those police aren’t following me, now they’re following you. What does that say?’ I’m young and I don’t have any influence, so I don’t know why, and my followers won’t give me an answer. I can only ask my friends to help me figure it out.

It's worth a read.

Can you say obscenely busy?

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Which is what I've been for the last week or so.Perhaps it's not as obscene as it sounds.  Perhaps it's been constructively busy.  Perhaps it's the last time that our being understaffed at work is going to be a problem (whoops, there goes my head, laughing itself off again).  Perhaps.But last week I was in Trinidad again, which entails a day's travel either way, and yesterday I was in Freeport, which requires a whole day of work -- flying out at 6:00 a.m. and returning (lucky for me) at 7:00 a.m.  But yesterday's trip was very productive.Gave me plenty to think about, though.  And a strong idea of how to think about it.Later.Can you say Cultural Policy?

On Tourism and Sustainable Development

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In early June, The Bahamas played host to a conference to discuss tourism and sustainable development.  Now I don’t mind telling you that I found that more than mildly ironic — if there’s one thing you can’t say about the current state of the Bahamian tourism industry, it’s that it’s sustainable.  The fact that the conference was held in the conference rooms of what was once the largest and splashiest hotel south of Atlantic City only increased the irony for me; I can remember the days when, as the Carnival Crystal Palace, the floors used to light up like a rainbow at night while we Bahamians lit candles in powercuts and fanned ourselves in front rooms hot as the infernal hinges.You see, there’s a danger in being some of the oldest hands in the business.  We Bahamians are no strangers to tourism; we’ve been raised for generations to learn to keep the tourist in mind.  The problem about that is this:  it’s the people who have been successful for a long time who have the hardest time changing.And the industry is changing right under our feet. Tourism is no longer considered the weak country’s last resort, the poor land’s friend.  It’s no longer regarded as the ultimate destroyer of national pride and self-worth, the creator of inequalities, the ruiner of environments and the spoiler of morals.  No; tourism is now the largest global industry, and every country on the planet is doing what we’ve been doing for the past two centuries:  inviting tourists home.The Bahamian tourist industry is almost 200 years old, having had its roots shortly after the failure of the cotton plantations, when Nassau was touted as a health resort among British physicians.  When Adela Hart visited the city in 1823-1824, there were already houses on rent for visitors, select tours to be had, and rudimentary entertainment — she writes about her carriage trips out to the Blue Hills and the Pine Barrens, and talks about hearing Bahamians singing.  The first major hotel was built in 1860; and tourism first hit its stride in the 1920s, when Americans descended on Nassau, Bimini and West End in search of liquor and fun, and took off at the end of the 1940s.  We are old hands.  Generations of Bahamians have been raised to take part in the hospitality trade, and most of our development has come hand in hand with tourism.But the trouble is, we’re no longer unique.  Where we once had an edge, selling sun, sand and sea in close proximity to the USA, the spread of easy global communications has turned that advantage into a liability.  When anyone can get anywhere, even the most remote location, by plane or helicopter or boat, when Hollywood TV crews can invade the secretest islands in the Pacific or the heart of the Central American rainforests to create a prime-time game show (think Survivor, people), there’s very little real appeal left in coming to Nassau, with its souvenirs made in China, its straw work made in Haiti and Jamaica (and China), and its T-shirts made — well, maybe in China, with a little red, gold, green and “Hey Mon” pressed onto them for Caribbean flavour.These days, we — some of the oldest hands in the business, with a tourist industry that rivals only the tourist industries of the Mediterranean in longevity — must face the fact that the kind of tourism we practice here is passé, suitable only for the lowest classes of tourists: the excursion visitors, the cruise ship passengers, people with little money and less taste.  Our model isn’t working so well any more.  Though we welcome huge numbers to our shores, those numbers don’t translate into the kinds of profits in the hands of Bahamians as one might imagine.So what have we done about it?Well, we’ve tried to change our image.  Instead of being known only for casino packages and cruise ship dockings, we’ve created resorts that offer more; we’ve got the theme parks of Atlantis and the exclusivity of the Four Seasons as a result. And now, we’re targeting an even more upscale market.  Instead of just selling a few days on a beach and a few nights in a casino, we’re selling marinas and golf courses and second homes to the super-rich who desire luxury living in exclusive locations.It’s been very successful indeed.  But it isn’t sustainable.Sustainability, you see, has to do with the ability of a place or a people to support a certain activity over an extended period of time and under different circumstances.  The official definition, as presented by scholars and policy makers, is this: Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.  And if it’s one thing that our current approach to tourism is not, it’s sustainable.It’s not sustainable because it doesn’t involve Bahamians at the foundation.  It depends primarily upon foreign investment, and trusts the investors to make sensible decisions about the impact of their developments on the Bahamian landscape and people.It’s not sustainable because it doesn’t place the uniqueness of The Bahamas — our landscapes, our culture, our selves — at the centre of the deal.  Oh, it sells that uniqueness, rather the way that Madison Avenue sells the features of cars; but we don’t make that uniqueness central to the endeavour, so much so that it will be preserved.And it’s not sustainable because it takes place more or less behind our backs.  We close our eyes at night, and open them the next morning with a new horizon before us.  We have no connection to the tourist product, and the tourist industry has no real connection to us.And so the irony of the tourism conference last week.  But there’s a danger that goes further than any irony can.  Until we can look at the industry as it is, not as it was, and see that the people and the culture and the history of The Bahamas are as appealing to the new tourists as the sun and sand once were — and more,  that while sun and sea can be found elsewhere, we can’t — until we learn to respect ourselves and demand the same respect from the people we let in to do our tourism for us, the development that comes from our tourism may be phenomenal in the short term, but it will never be sustainable.

On Censorship

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A couple of months ago, the entire Bahamian community was convulsed by the banning of the movie Brokeback Mountain. All sorts of people weighed in on the issue, but the argument never really got off the ground. The reason for that was that there were really two arguments going on. One was the question of homosexuality. This argument suggested that the Bahamas (government, Christian community or censorship board) was duty-bound to protect the public morality against the evils of same-sex love. The other was the view that adult citizens of a democratic nation should be given the opportunity to choose whether to expose themselves to those evils or not.Now there should be no doubt in my readers’ minds where I stand. I believe that the pulling of the movie was arbitrary, hypocritical and absurd. In all likelihood, it was a knee-jerk reaction on the part of a handful of influential people who assumed that the Bahamian public would not object. But I don’t want to talk about that. Not yet.Quite simply, the existence of the Bahamas Plays and Films Control Board is an anachronism. As many have pointed out before me, it is an organization whose banning of anything is absurd in a society where radio stations play uncensored lyrics on an almost daily basis, where Bahamians are featured – and feature themselves – in homegrown pornography on the World Wide Web, and where any “immorality” can be purchased in the privacy of one’s home by those people willing to pay the price.Now I am not saying this to call for the expansion of the scope of the Board, or of the Act which establishes it. No. What I am saying is that the time has come for Bahamians to recognize the incompatability of such a body with the age in which we live. Information of every kind is all around us, available to anyone with access to a radio, a television, a satellite or a computer. Banning the showing of a movie in this context is ludicrous.But it is more than that. The real problem with the banning of Brokeback Mountain is that it demonstrates that this same handful of anonymous, appointed and unaccountable Bahamians have the ability under the law to control and stifle Bahamian creativity. It’s one thing to talk about a movie set in the American mid-west, made by a Chinese director, featuring a love story that many Bahamians clearly find repugnant. But what happens when a Bahamian wishes to address a topic the Board finds distasteful? Should the law have the right to tell him that he cannot? The banning of a movie may be absurd. But the banning of a play is quite a different matter.It is not inconceivable, especially given the precedent set by the banning of Brokeback Mountain, that such a banning might take place. Indeed, there have been instances in the past where plays produced by Bahamians have been forced to change their presentations or face closure. The fact that, under the terms of the Act that establishes it, the Board has the obligation to vet any production, rate it, recommend changes or close it down has serious implications for the foundations of our democracy.That the Board and the supporters of the Brokeback banning are hypocritical is evident in the fact that The Da Vinci Code, a movie based on the heresy that Christ did not die on the cross, but married Mary Magdalene and sired a line of descendents who exist to this day – is currently showing in the self-same theatres from which Brokeback was pulled. But to focus on this hypocrisy misses the real point. As long as legislation remains on the books that permits an anonymous body to control what Bahamians watch, and worse, what Bahamians write and perform, our culture, and our democracy, are challenged.One final point. The discussion that was generated by the Brokeback affair raised the question of the very constitutionality of the Board. Now our Constitution protects the freedom of expression of the Bahamian citizen (Article 23). But it’s not an absolute protection. There are some limitations designed to protect defence, public safety, public order, public morality and public health, and it is permissible under the Constitution to regulate communications, public exhibitions and public entertainment.On the surface, then, the curtailing of absolute freedom of expression is permissible under the Bahamian constitution. Except here’s where it gets iffy. There’s a caveat to all of this protection of the public, and it’s this: one can regulate things in the interest of public morality, etc, “except so far as … the thing done … is shown not to be reasonably justifiable in a democratic society.”It’s iffy because what’s reasonably justifiable in a democratic society changes with time. The goalposts move. This idea makes reference to a global consensus on what is “democratic”, and that changes. Forty years ago it was not undemocratic for the state to put its citizens to death for certain offences; today, however, most democracies consider it undemocratic, even barbaric, to impose the death penalty indiscriminately. Twenty years ago it might have been fine to challenge artwork that was considered indecent, homosexual, or otherwise offensive to public morality; but today in democratic societies that is no longer the case. We are living in a world whose boundaries are not fixed, and we have to be prepared for them to move.I believe that the time has come to admit that the kind of legislation that permits a body of non-elected, faceless individuals to decide what the Bahamian citizen should be able to see is fundamentally obsolete.I believe that the time has come to recognize that the recent actions of the Bahamas Plays and Films Control Board are not reasonably justifiable in a democratic society.I believe that the time has come to revisit the Theatres and Films Act, to consider its place in this era of information, and, ultimately, to amend it to fit the age in which we live.

Home again, home again, jiggety-jig

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This week had its own interesting stuff. On Monday and Tuesday I was involved in meetings with experts brought to Nassau by Daniel Glaser, NESTA Fellow who worked with Winston Saunders during the latter part of 2005 and the beginning of 2006, and who co-wrote with me the Draft National Cultural Policy.  Meetings were held regarding the creation of a Junkanoo Museum, and regarding arts and business in The Bahamas, and they were very good meeting indeed.  Then on Wednesday I flew off to Crooked Island, Long Cay and Acklins for Festival adjudications.  I returned yesterday.Hope to be grounded for a week or more at least.  Need to be grounded.  Need to set up new offices in a semi-permanent space, and to get my head around the big things that should be happening this year.Need to write some more Essays on Life, too, egad.

Happy May

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So the lights have been out on Blogworld for a week or so.  Reason?  Business travel.  Not a good reason, you say; you can carry the computer with you when you go, you say.  And I say, true.  But I can't carry the internet.You see, the travel has mostly been to other islands in the archipelago.  I would've said Family Islands, except that one of the islands was Grand Bahama and Grand Bahamians seem to take offence when they're called Family Islanders, especially those who reside in Freeport.The schedule went like this:Monday - Long IslandTuesday - Long IslandWednesday - ExumaThursday - Grand BahamaAnd then I left the country and flew off to New Orleans to attend the Jazz and Heritage Festival.  Came in this afternoon.Not much time to think, let alone write.  So there that is.But happy Maytide anyway.

Larry Smith on the so-called Gay Agenda

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Over on Bahama Pundit, Larry Smith responds to a letter from a trio of pastors published in the Tribune in response to the media firestorm about Brokeback Mountain.Here's an excerpt:

Pastor Lyall Bethel (of Grace Gospel Chapel) and others recently drew our attention to the "Homosexual Agenda" to take over the world.After much research we were able to confirm that this master plan does exist. Here’s an excerpt from the document that we were able to pull down from a secret web site:6am - Gym8am - Breakfast (oatmeal and egg whites)9am - Hair appointment10am - ShoppingNoon - Brunch2pm - Convert all straight youngsters to homosexuality, destroy all heterosexual marriages, establish a global chain of homo-breeding prisons where straight women are turned into artificially impregnated baby factories to produce prepubescent love slaves for the gay leadership, and secure total control of the Internet for the exclusive use of child pornographers.2:30pm - 40 winks of beauty rest to prevent facial wrinkles from stress of world conquest4pm - Cocktails6pm - Light dinner (soup, salad. with Chardonnay)8pm - Theatre11pm - Bed (du jour)Actually, Pastor Bethel’s remarks are not as silly as the above parody makes out. They are drawn from the strong views of powerful religious and social groups in the United States, led by conservative preachers like Jerry Falwell (of Moral Majority fame) and Pat Robertson (of the Christian Broadcasting Network).

What's really interesting about that post is the discussion that follows.  It's well worth a look.

A little something for non-conservative Christians to think about

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I just discovered this post, by Amy Sullivan. Though it's nearly two years since it was posted, it's still a good read.I specially liked this bit (read all the way to the end to find it):

... when the only Christian-themed entertainment in the marketplace is laced with conservatism, Christianity itself will increasingly take on a conservative cast. The faith of Dorothy Day and Martin Luther King Jr. and Reinhold Niebuhr is not the faith of Tim LaHaye and Mel Gibson. Yet the more that single interpretation of Christianity dominates airwaves and bookshelves, the more people of faith are tempted to believe that the only way to be a "good" Christian is to be a conservative.

Conservative is not the only way to worship Christ. And anyway, in Roman Judea, He wasn't conservative at all.

Trinidad

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In addition to sitting in meetings for three days, and then sitting on planes for two more, we were treated to a number of activities (in the evenings, natch). They were all related to culture, and they were all stimulating in different ways.On the first night, the members of the Interim Festival Directorate of CARIFESTA were taken to the National Museum and Art Gallery for a tour and a reception. I'd been there before -- my sister-in-law Tammy's sister, JoAnn, took me there two years ago. The lower floor is the museum, which is efficiently arranged, with a variety of exhibits in different rooms, and the upper floor is the art gallery. Last time I went, I saw what I can only presume was a sample of the national collection, which included paintings from a number of Trini luminaries. But as it was Holy Week, there was a special exhibition on, called Christ in Trinidad. The artist, Jackie Hinkson, was there to meet us. More on that later.On the second night, we (now all the members of the Regional Cultural Committee) were given what was called a "Window on CARIFESTA", at which the Trinidadian logo was unveiled, the jingle was played, and some taste of the kind of show that we might see in September was shared. The evening was a multidisciplinary event, though the disciplines were primarily theatre and music. More on that later.On the third night, we were treated to seats at a production of Jesus Christ Superstar at the Queen's Hall, courtesy of the Minister of Culture, and then we were further treated to a visit to the All Stars Pan Yard. That was the highlight of the evening. After that we were taken to dinner and were returned home in the wee hours.More on that later.

Where I don't want us to go

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This report, lodged in TIME, calls Jamaica "the most homophobic nation on earth", but observes that the Caribbean doesn't do very well on the whole with homosexuality and homophobia.And I quote:

Brian wears sunglasses to hide his gray and lifeless left eye—damaged, he says, by kicks and blows with a board from Jamaican reggae star Buju Banton. Brian, 44, is gay, and Banton, 32, is an avowed homophobe whose song Boom Bye-Bye decrees that gays "haffi dead" ("have to die"). In June 2004, Brian claims, Banton and some toughs burst into his house near Banton's Kingston recording studio and viciously beat him and five other men. After complaints from international human-rights groups, Banton was finally charged last fall, but in January a judge dismissed the case for lack of evidence. It was a bitter decision for Brian, who lost his landscaping business after the attack and is fearful of giving his last name. "I still go to church," he says as he sips a Red Stripe beer. "Every Sunday I ask why this happened to me."Though familiar to Americans primarily as a laid-back beach destination, Jamaica is hardly idyllic. The country has the world's highest murder rate. And its rampant violence against gays and lesbians has prompted human-rights groups to confer another ugly distinction: the most homophobic place on earth.

CARIFESTA

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The Caribbean Festival of Arts was established in 1972 to celebrate the Caribbean arts. There have been eight of these so far, held throughout the region. Until this point, it has been primarily a governmental exercise, but in 2003 a proposal to revamp the festival has recommended that it be opened up to the wider public. The new proposed festival makes room for a fringe (i.e. individuals who wish to attend outside of their governments' official contingents) and for more open attendance.CARIFESTA moves, like the Olympics, from territory to territory. This year it's to be held in Trinidad and Tobago. There's a website here:http://www.carifesta.netMore later.