African & Caribbean contributor – Joel O’Loughlin
Every child has value but when a child from London dies it jangles our English heartstrings. The news of Jamaican rose Imani Green, 8, hit in the head by a bullet while playing in a shop on holiday with family was no exception. The angelic face of this “happy, playful child” evoked in me the primal fear of losing one of my own.
Such a loss is unimaginably painful to any parent so, my mind quickly switched to analgesic questions like “wha’ wrong with these crazy yardies?”, “should I let my grandson go Jamaica next year?” and eventually “what the hell am I thinking?”
The latter took a while in coming and brought me up sharp when it hit. Because, what the hell, was I thinking? This horrible crime is almost a facsilimile of the shooting of little Thusha Kamaleswaran at Stockwell Food and Wine shop in Brixton a couple of years ago; so where did this Jamaicaphobia drop into my gut from?.
It would be easy for me to blame the media because news of a British fatality is always accompanied by a warning about whichever renegade region of the world in which disaster strikes. But why is it that we so readily embrace the notion that Britain and America are our safest havens?
Let’s for a moment ignore other violent crimes, there is on average 3 murders in London every day. Last year the Jamaican Gleaner reported “at the beginning of the year we were about five murders per day. Now we are down to two murders per day”. OK I grant you this is not a favourable comparison, but when you place a city against a whole country what can you expect?
We can trade statistics, but stats don’t get you killed – circumstances and people do. The fact is cities are hotbeds of tensions which sometimes spill blood, but move into the provinces and rural areas the climate becomes more pacific. Unfortunately for Imani, country life did not protect her from gunmen with no concern for life and innocence. Where such men are concerned no place is safe.
Imani Green. Photo courtesy telegraph.co.uk
Before fear stops you packing tins of Heinz baked beans into your suitcase and getting on the plane to Kingston; I suggest that you read Michael Moore’s Survival Tips for Black People, in his book Stupid White Men. He says “Amy McCampbell, one of the numerous African-Americans I’ve hired since I started writing this chapter suggests that for those who want to return to their “black roots,” there’s only one way to go–the Caribbean!
She says: “How about Barbados? It’s a tropical paradise; the people are peaceful, and crime is nonexistent. Life expectancy is well into the seventies. Eighty percent of the population is African, so we’d feel right at home. They even speak English! And here’s the weird part–we’d get to call Queen Elizabeth our head of state. Whoa!” Sounds nice, huh?”
If I could suggest a resting place for little Imani Green without offending her family, I would suggest “if you check it out Lord noweh no better dan yard”.
