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The truth is, I do not know what to do, we do not know what to do. And while I sit at home, thinking of all the many ways life could have taken a different turn, for better, I acknowledge that this is the turn we have and a lot of people are living through the worst of it.
I am cognizant of the truth that oppression doesn’t take a break, not in a pandemic, not ever, yet I sometimes find myself hoping it does, that when things like COVID-19 happen, it could be a moment for the perpetrators to pause and reflect, to be struck by our collective humanity.
Instead and to no surprise at all, COVID-19 is being used as an excuse to unleash the worst form of discrimination against minorities.
When the Nurse in Nevada, said, in tears “… they are murdering these people and nobody cares because they are all minorities… this is the hood… black lives don’t matter here…” It becomes all too realistic and incredibly painful how, in the middle of a global pandemic, we are still met with rather familiar systems and fruits of oppression: racism, discrimination, and stigma.
That humans have to not only fight for their lungs to breathe, they have to also fight for their lives in the hands of racist caregivers.
Sheltered LBGTQ+ residents in Uganda, have been arrested under the pretext of, “a negligent act likely to spread infection of disease.” What is negligent about homeless youths, being indoors, in a shelter? What is negligent about taking up space?
What they fear is not a disregard for the law, it is freedom, the freedom that can come from community, the freedom that sprouts from knowing that you have a tribe willing to go to war for your sake, there is nothing negligent about that.
I am equally moved by the ways in which community continues to show up for each other. In Nigeria, and for the various threats to safety, the Bisi Alimi Foundation, is providing financial relief to LGBTQ Nigerians.
As you read this on IDAHOBIT, the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia 2020, my message to you, ally to ally, is that you do not look the other way. The systems that keep LGBTQ+ people down thrive on our culture of unseeing, they need you to stay not unaware but unbothered.
At Minority Africa, we published an editorial last year where we distinguished between unseeing and unlooking, both radical weapons of oppression. We said and I leave you with this today: To unsee is deeper than just unlooking, while the latter functions on a premise of acknowledgment, unseeing, however, requires that you not only look away but that you forget.
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