READING LIST: Books I Love That You Need To Read Now

I like to read a lot, and I highly recommend it to everyone. When someone tells me that they don’t like reading, I just assume they haven’t found the right book, or that they’re content with being stupid. There is no excuse not to read; it expands your world view, opens you up to differing opinions (or provide you with support for the opinions you already have, if you know how to look). That said, here I have, in no particular order, some of my all time favourite books:

Love is a Mixtape by Rob Sheffield makes me cry, every single time. It’s a life story and a love story told in songs. The author begins every chapter of his life with a tracklist from a mixtape from his past, and not only is it wildly emotional and imaginative, it’s funny and keeps you engaged the whole way through. A great love story but not simply that. Great for fans of Rachel Cohn & David Leviathan.

Candy by Kevin Brooks is not just good. This book is so unbelievably and irrevocably unreasonably unfathomably good that I'm using far too many adjectives simply because I can't explain how good it is. It is visceral it is mind blowing it is too good to explain. Read this book. Go to the bookstore, the library and get this book then read it in one sitting, you will thank me later. Candy is a love story and manifesto against modern society and what it does to children. It covers addiction, love (as always), and bullying in a way that doesn’t make you want to claw your eyes out from cliche overload.

The Gospel According to Coco Chanel is a fun take on the typical memoir. I’ve always been a fan of how-to-books and the tongue in cheek way Karen Karbo applies Coco Chanel’s personal rules for personal behaviour is flawless. To say that the book was fantastic would have been an understatement. Beautifully written with wit and charm, the book holds the personality of Coco herself; snarky, elegant and ever so intelligent. My only criticism being Karbo's holier than thou attitude towards the end of the book where she tackles Coco's romantic entanglement with a Nazi, though that may just be my bias towards the blind nature of love. Conclusion: go to your nearest bookstore and purchase this book this very instant - it's a work of art.

Pretty Little Dirty by Amanda Boyden faultlessly captures the life of two best friends experiencing a very severe adolescence. It’s honest and does a fantastic job of peeking inside the mind of a young girl. It expertly touches on the existential crisis of young adult hood and the complexities of human relation as well as the chasm between how we see people and how they really are. Too good to be dismissed as just another young adult novel. Its language is visceral and real and the storyline is honest, one of my favourite coming of age novels since the Catcher in the Rye.

The Gingerbread Series by Rachel Cohn were the books that made me fall in love with young adult fiction. Fun, whimsical and extremely quotable, it’s a silly love story about the Goth bastard (do we still use this word?) daughter of a millionaire and a Vegas dancer and a tiny surfer dude in San Francisco. It reads like Juno in book form (was Juno a book?). I promise, it’s way better than it sounds. The last book in the series, Cupcake actually shows growth in the main character which was something that really caught me off guard, so there’s that to look forward too with this series.

The Torn Skirt’s Rebecca Godfrey's style reminds me of Hunter S. Thompson in that it's so gritty, but it's that same grittiness that makes it so believably adolescent. It's main character is actually pretty perfect being that she's the perfect blend of confused teenager and profound philosopher (my favourite kind of teenage character), and the first person narrative lends the book a necessary point of view, allowing her run ins with urchins and prostitutes to be seen through her naivety (not to mention that without it, the storyline would have been too confusing to manage). That being said though the storyline comes across rather dreamy or as I like to say rather Virgin Suicides-y, it's executed very well. If you’re not a fan of poetry you’ll probably get annoyed that the story line is probably the least important thing about the book, the point being a feeling - the feeling of being a teenager and experiencing the world in a new way for the first time. Imagine the Rum Diary but Paul Kemp is a teenage girl and you’re picturing The Torn SKirt. 

I like memoirs. Like, a lot. So the second one on this list will be Wasted, by Marya Hornbacher. Wasted is a chronicle of Hornbacher’s personal experience with eating disorders that she dealt with the entirety of her life. It is vivid and honest and for those with reservations about nonfiction, it does not read like a biography but rather a fantastic first person narrative exploring the ups and downs of her life and how her demons followed her through them.

See what I just said about memoirs? Here’s another one. Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen you might know from the movie starring Winnona Ryder and Angelina Jolie - which I recommend 100% as well. You will probably leave the book wondering if you suffer from the same mental disorder as the writer/storyteller, because, as the book explores, most of her symptoms just seem like growing up, or rather, they seem very understandably human. Fans of American Horror Story: Asylum will feel right at home with the imagery (it’s set in a psychiatric ward). One of my all time favourite books, my journals from four years ago are filled with quotes from it; “razors pain you; rivers are damp; acids stain you; and drugs cause cramp. Guns arent lawful; nooses give; gas smells awful; you might as well live.”

The Count of Monte Cristo is my favourite book + movie of all time. That’s it. It is the greatest story ever told as far as I’m concerned, and it is so quotable that I literally find something new to fall in love with every time I read the book or watch the movie. If the unabridged novel is too dense for you, the 2002 movie is so great that it can stand in for it. I’ve been, since childhood obsessed with it (which might explain a lot about me - this story is messed up), and it’s so universally applicable because it’s themes, love, betrayal, revenge, money, power, they are eternal ideals that have always and will always affect us as individuals. Bonus points: Richard Harris (the first [good] Dumbledore) played the priest (one of the best characters !!!) in the film & Fernand Mondego is one of the most unapologetic villains that you can’t help but enjoy his epic selfishness and self involvement. Did I mention Napoleon Bonaparte is in this? Literally everything about this story is fantastic. I almost tattooed “We are all kinds or pawns of men” on my forearm, this book is revolutionary.

I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell by Tucker Max; you saw the movie. Read the book. Laugh hysterically. Have a beer. You’re welcome.

Like Water For Chocolate is freaking beautiful. Laura Esquivel is a wordsmith if I ever encountered one, her first novel reading like an epic ballad with vivid imagery. It’s rural setting also lends itself very well to the Belizean imagination, that is to say that our collective memory holds more images that could be applied to the books landscape, which, for me, made the vivid imagery that much more rich. This book feels like drinking hot mayan chocolate, and my favourite part of it, the first time I read it was that each chapter begins with a recipe. My summer plans include rereading it, this time cooking along as the story progresses. Laura Esquivel is quite honestly, a creative genius (the Law of Love from her also comes highly recommended).

Jodi Picoult, very famously wrote My Sisters Keeper. Now I’ve never read that (saw the movie) but if it’s half as good as the Tenth Circle, I might have to. Set in Alaska, the state with the highest suicide rate in the US and it follows three different stories at once - the disintegrating marriage of the parents, the crisis (spoilers) of their daughter and everyone’s eventual descent into hell by way of the fathers graphic novel (which is included in the novel as a way to further the story!!! Can you says ‘multimedia piece’?!” about the Inferno which incidentally is the topic the mother character teaches a class at the local university. It looks at family in a very interesting light and it’s just plain cool.

Last book on the list is the Virgin Suicides, a book and movie that I use to explain the mood of other books (re: the Torn Skirt). The Virgin Suicides was quote possibly the most interesting book I’ve ever read which is, in all likelihood caused by it’s bizarre format. It is written from the collective perspective of a group of grown men, that, from their adolescence, were obsessed with the Lisbon girls. It reads like idol worship, with their near religious devotion to the physical items they have, over the years collected from parts of the girls’ story. It’s floaty and ethereal and otherworldly. Possibly set in the same town as Donnie Darko, which, quite frankly, explains a lot.

Notable mention: I came very close to including these books, but because of their widespread popularity, I decided to leave them off the list. Everyone knows what John Green’s Looking for Alaska is about for example, so no point reviewing it. It and the rest of these, however, are some of my all time favourite books, and still come widely recommended. Wintergirls (tw: eating disorders, self harm), Perks of Being a Wallflower (tw: sexual abuse), The Great Gatsby, the Prince, the Art of War, the Luxe, Fight Club, the Bell Jar, My Booky Wook (tw: drug abuse), Lolita, The Hemming Way, How to Climb Mt. Blanc in a Skirt: A Handbook for the Lady Adventurer, Animal Farm, everything by John Green really, and Crime & Punishment (which I don’t really recommend unless you can handle really dense nonfiction). Lastly, some of my favourite philosophers are Kafka, Sartre, Nietzsche and Camus from which I recommend anything. 

There’s obviously a lot more, and another time I’ll make another list, but for now, happy reading.

holland twenty fourteen

Holland was a blur. Those duchies are intense. Amsterdam kicked my ass up and down the red-light, but I have a few photos to show for it.

The Five People You Meet In Belize (pt. 2)

A purposely mis-titled (satirical) anthology on the social structure of Belize

Open Instagram. Scroll a bit. Did you by any chance see a photo with any of the following tags?

#werkwerk #onmygrind #gettinpaper #flexin #workhardplayhard #onmyhustle #hustlin #youngniggarichnigga #onmycomeup #stackin #papers #stackstackinmypaperz etc etc etc

Of course you did. Because you're following a Belizean Hustler (don't blame yourself, we all are). This person has, in all likelihood, a rather average job, but has, through extensive mental gymnastics, convinced themself that they are Tony Montana and their 2012 Michael Kohrs watch is a rolly. Their theme song is anything from Jay-Z (no not Rick Ross. that song is older than I am) and their favorite drink is Nuvo.
These 'hustlers' who are typically male (though we all know the independent female hustler who don't need no man) and are famous for their mating call of "bwai mek we buy wah pitcha". Their natural mates are Belizean models.

The Belizean DJ. See Belizean model. Replace necessary words with "laptop computer" and "virtual DJ". (HERE I did it for you) Their mating calls include, but are not limited to "check out my mixtape" and the old faithful "I'm a DJ".

A relative of the Belizean W.A.S.P., the Belizean Bourgeoisie comes from money. “But Samantha, in Marxist literature, the term bourgeoisie refers to a member of the middle-class, not the ruling elite,” shut up. This series isn’t called Accurate Application of Communist Vocabulary Words. I’m not a Marxist philosopher and I don’t play one of TV. The Belizean Bourgeoisie is to the B.W.A.S.P. what the Hilton Family is to the Vanderbilts. Two sides of the same coin, with aesthetic differences. Where the B.W.A.S.P. will, as a prerequisite, have a home in Saint Georges (for these purposes, St. Georges takes on the role of Martha’s Vineyard), the Bourgie has has a vacation home.. somewhere. Anywhere, really. Where the B.W.A.S.P. is uniformed in Abercrombie, the Bourgie’s dress-code varies, but is typically more flashy. They’ve all known each other for ages, and so have their parents, and quite possibly their parents parents. They have MacBooks and went to B.E.S. or Hummingbird and they won't go to certain clubs because “I have a rolex. Come on.” Their names are generally recognisable by people who have never met them (people who, coincidentally, have many opinions about them, despite this fact), and they typically end up marrying each other, their mating call being “remember when Ms. Nisbet/my mom/your mom … when we were 9?”

A parvenu is a person who is a relative newcomer to a socioeconomic class. The word is borrowed from the French language mostly because straight up calling this section the Belizean Socialclimber would step on too many toes. Oh but I still did it. Oops. The Belizean Social Climber is exactly what I sounds like; post-Cruffy, with an end goal of Belizean W.A.S.P. (or Belizean Bourgeoisie). Hallmark signs of a BSC (we've got abrevs now, keep up) are pointless lies ("my dining table can seat 25 people" no it can't. why should it?), an almost religious dedication to fashion trends, an address book filled to the brim, a false sense of superiority and a total lack of loyalty. Do you have a boat? Is there a person who is always asking for you to take them to sandbar? Congratulations, you've caught yourself a leach. The final goal of the BSC is to almost literally single white female someone who they see to be superior to them socially. They want to be you, and when they can't, then want to be your best best best friend. The BSC will surround themself with B.W.A.S.P.s and Bourgies and then only date within the circle. He has to have a car, and it doesn't matter if he has a girlfriend (or boyfriend, where applies). This is how the BSC survives, sucking the life out of everyone around them. There are, however, very few success stories for the BSC, except for the select few who managed to snag a ring. Do yo thang, Dan Humphrey*. Do yo thang.

"Stop posting pictures of ceviche/Belikin/the sea/fry jacks/tacos" - the Belizean Expat. The BE is, put very simply, a Belizean outside of Belize. More often than not, they reside in Florida or Texas, and a fair amount were not as vocal about their love for their home country until they realised that comparatively, Milport is pretty cheap and having to sneak around to drink alcohol two years after turning 18 isn’t as fun as it was the first time around. It is often said that a Belizean permanently remaining abroad is an uncommon occurrence, and the Belizean Expat is nothing if not a testament to that. Spring Break? Belize! Thanks giving? Belize! Where do most of their friends live despite having been gone more than a year? Belize! But that’s not a character fault, that’s patriotism, right? And their mating call? I miss Belize.

That's it for this list, join us next time for five more chances to think I'm talking about you! (And five more chances to probably be wrong.) Happy hen-pecking!

*patron saint of social climbing

Side note: the original article was written a year ago, and was actually a school assignment. This one was written twenty minutes ago. Any suggestions for new archetypes are highly recommended and can be done in the comments section or anonymously on my tumblr, since half y'all trifflin. Once more, this is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. So get your panties out of a bunch.

The Five People You Meet In Belize

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

Though there may be the Kriol to English dictionary and the ever popular Ping Wing Juk Mi, I find that there is a big empty space where a lot of Belizean literature should be. Because of this Belizean fiction situation, or lack-there-of, I’m not surprised that no one has written what I am about to write, but I’m more than certain that anyone who reads this will report to thinking it more than a few times. Without further ado, I present to you a field guide on Belizeans; the Five People You Meet In Belize

First we will speak about the ever-present and ever popular to talk about; the Kruffy (also spelled Cruffy, Kruffi, Cruffi, etc). More often than not, the Kruffy is proud to be exactly what he/she is. In fact, most Kruffies will call themselves Kruffy. But there hangs the question; what makes one a Kruffy? It is commonly astute to that the Kruffy as it is said is “interfering” (or intafasting depending on the source). This, to me, summons up the picture of an older heavy set woman by her clothes line listening in on her neighbors conversation, but hey, that’s just me. If we’re using the BelizeanLinkUp twitter account as any sort of reference it is also said that the Kruffy will “iron ih Carnival clothes from August” and “mek a CD with Popcaan, Kartel, Mavada, Usher, Mariah Carey and Luther Vandross”, but these are the kind of jokes you will only understand after you have met someone you could appropriately call “Kruffy”. A Kruffy is the person you see at club on a Friday night wearing purple skinny jeans, purple shoes, purple hat, purple streak in their hair and a white shirt. The Kruffy is obnoxious, the Kruffy is loud but above all the Kruffy is Belizean. Though pride in ones country is not a secularly Kruffy trait, it is a prerequisite for the classification Kruffy. Although they may travel to “fa-ren” a few times a year to purchase clothing that they will invariably wear without removing the tags, they always come home to Belize, and they’re always happy to be right here.

The next person we will observe is the Belizean Celebrity. These are the people that may or may not have done something worthwhile with their lives, but nonetheless have ended up in Belize and have proceeded to think far too highly of themselves. This imagined self worth invariably leads to books being published, shows being put on, all generally under the facade of “art”. The Belizean “Artist” (be careful to remember the quotation marks around the word “artist”) very often will fall under the category of the Belizean Celebrity, for this reason, though the Belizean Celebrity is not always a Belizean “artist”.These people will, for obvious attention grabbing reasons, have a very active facebook/twitter account on which they will perpetuate their self-aggrandizement. I’ve said it several times and I will say it here, this sort of person is, to me, the Belizean equivalent of Paris Hilton; they’ve never done anything to justify the attention that they get, even though they may have once, long ago say, written a book, or taken a  photograph, or been on the news, the attention they receive is more than a surplus from that one activity could ever warrant. (There is a sub category of this known as the Belizean Teenage Celebrity, but that we wont address just yet.) This, however, brings me to the next type of person we’ll speak about.

The Belizean Photgrapher. The Belizean Photographer is almost without fail, a teenager with an overpriced camera. There’s really not much more I can say about this subject other than that anyone with a facebook remembers that one period of time where every teenage girl with a camera had a fan page for her “photography”. The Belizean photographer, does, however, leave me with the perfect segue to the next sort of person I will address.

The Belizean “Model” has come to be any girl with a friend who has a camera, any girl who has a cell phone, any girl who wears clothes and may at any point in time have been photographed, really anyone who wants to call themselves a model. This trend has, across the grid, infuriated real Belizean fashion designers who have never heard of these girls and real Belizean models (read as girls and women who get paid to walk up a runway/be photographed in a designers clothing or girls and women who know you shouldn’t kimbo at the end of the runway thank you very much) who have, thanks to these “models”, henceforth been doomed to the question “yeah, you ‘model’ but what do you really do?”

Lastly, I’ll address the Belizean W.A.S.P. (W.A.S.P. is a reference to the white anglo-saxon protestants of the United States. This usually refers to affluent people in the New England area, but also whites of "old money" in other areas throughout the country). This type of person was more often than not, born into wealth in Belize, whether it be old money, or new money, they were born into it.  And boy do they know it. This moniker does not address every wealthy person in Belize, and as we move on through the explanation, you will understand why. The Belizean W.A.S.P. will often own a house at St. Georges Caye, fly out to San Pedro for Costa Maya rather than take the boat, owns more than 3 pairs of Sperry’s and has a wardrobe that mainly consists of Abercrombie and Hollister clothing. To talk about the Belizean W.A.S.P.s  personality is hedging a bet, because it’s about half and half. You’ll meet some that are the nicest people in the world, and then there are those who think know that they’re better than you. These are the sort of people you’ll see every weekend at Tavern and who each time have on a completely new outfit. Despite their wealth, oddly enough, they seem to have a penchant for cheap Belizean rum either in the form of the “panty rippa” or the time honored “rum and coke”.

That’s all the time I have for now, and yes, I know there are so many more different kinds of people in Belize, but five is all I could manage (for now?!). As you can see, our population is quite diverse. I hope you enjoyed!

The Modern Legislative Impact of British Imperialism Within the Commonwealth

The British Empire, an international superpower, which, for over a century was the foremost global power, has had far reaching influence since the 16th century. With colonial settlements in nearly every part of the world, Great Britain was poised for global domination. It is within these colonies that the crown set in motion a body of laws rooted in the morality of the day that would stay in place far beyond the time that they were repealed in Britain itself. These remaining fossils left over from days of colonial rule and pervasive imperialism have served to misguide commonwealth nations both diminutive in size, and vast, when it comes to social equality and personal liberty, for which innumerable battles are being waged to this day. 

Imperialism is defined as “a policy of extending a country's power and influence through diplomacy or military force.” Imperialism between the 16th and 18th century, the height of Britain's power, was universally enacted without diplomacy, and with heavy military force, that is, unless negotiations were between two European powers over a territory. Diplomacy, was, however, very unlikely to have been offered to natives by European imperialists. At it’s height, Britain held upwards of 115 individual territories worldwide, a list with colonies varying in size from the vastness of Australia to tiny Bermuda.

It was not only soldiers and warships that were sent to these patches of land scattered across the globe. Missionaries in black coats were sent out in droves to spread Christianity to the ‘savages’ who found new borders and rules sprouting up around them. Every Sunday these men of god would stand on pulpits in holy houses built of freshly felled wood and rail against amoral practices that would become felonies on the books. It was through this that numerous colonies, upon finding independence, ratified constitutions that were theocratically biased including enforceable codes of ethics rooted in the religious practices brought to them by imperialistic Britain. 

One such commonwealth colony turned independent nation, His Majesty's Settlement in the Bay of Honduras or British Honduras, now Belize, was subjected to all manner of British colonialism. Initially settled by pirates, British Honduras became a logging colony, to deter the constant threat from Spanish invasion. With the high demand for hardwood within the British empire, the Bay of Honduras was a valuable territory, and as with all British colonies, the vast majority of capital was in the hands of Europeans. This was in part due to laws set by the Legislative Assembly (and assembly composed of British colonists) that restricted the ownership of land to europeans; excluding the Maya and the large population of freed slaves residing within the territory. 

The 1855 European dominated Legislative Assembly had given large landowners in the colony firm titles to their vast estates “but did not allow the Maya to own land; the Maya could only rent land or live on reservations,” a policy whose trickle down through the years has resulted in, policies that, while are still less severe, have all but annexed the modern Maya from leaving their reservations. Though this piece of legislature is not rooted in morality, it is still a remnant of imperialist British rule, whose repercussions the young government of Belize has yet to shake.

To begin looking at how pervasively Britain’s morality centered laws have ingrained themselves within modern commonwealth governments, the constitution is always the best place to begin, and with the case of Belize, that is no different.

WHEREAS the People of Belize- a. affirm that the Nation of Belize shall be founded upon principles which acknowledge the supremacy of God, faith in human rights and fundamental freedoms, the position of the family in a society of free men and free institutions, the dignity of the human person and the equal and inalienable rights with which all members of the human family are endowed by their Creator, 

The presence of the Judeo-Christian god within the constitution, arguably the most important document belonging to a nation, sets the mood for the rest of this study. One of the biggest differences between the Belizean emphasis on God within state documents and that of the United States (in God we trust, etc) is that within the former British colony of British Honduras, it is commonly applied. The separation of church and state is a concept almost universally foreign to small commonwealth countries with the church playing a very large part in national politics. A fair comparison would be to the current state of affairs within the United States when it comes to the influence of corporations within governmental proceedings; the church is the biggest most influential special interest group within many commonwealth countries, particularly those who have only recently achieved independence. 

In 98% of commonwealth countries, for example, abortion is only legal if the mother’s life is directly in danger, a policy supported by the many pieces of church propaganda plastered onto billboards proclaiming “one dead, one wounded.” Rape is not considered a special circumstance for which abortion is acceptable. Abortion, which is a universally divisive issue, however is not descriptive enough of the commonwealth in particular to define the state of theocracy present. A case observed recently in Belize regarding witchcraft exemplifies the issue more starkly.

In March of 2013, Patrick E. Jones reported the case of three bottles unearthed in the Cayo district. Within one of these jars was found a candle, a ribbon, herbs of some kind and the identification card of the prospective “victim”. According to Jones, “It contains what, by all accounts was someone putting a curse on another person.” The person for whom the curse was intended was duly notified. The perpetrator was brought up on charges under SUMMARY JURISDICTION (OFFENSES) ACT CHAPTER 98 3.-(1) viii; “A person who pretends or professes to tell fortunes, or uses any subtle craft or device by palmistry, obeah or any such like superstitious means to deceive and impose upon any person whomsoever ... is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.” The status of such actions as misdemeanors, of course, are remnants of British anti-witchcraft laws. This is not the first time someone has been brought up on these charges. In 2004, a Guatemalan man living in Cayo was arrested for ‘pretending to tell fortunes’. In India, accusing a woman of witchcraft is a common ploy to grab land.  

However, British Imperialism has not only left the commonwealth with laws based in superstition. Recent polls have shown that 41 of the 53 members of the modern Commonwealth of Nations declare homosexuality to be illegal. Belize in particular holds homosexuality to be unconstitutional, something which is being challenged presently. Uganda, with it’s Minister of Ethics and Integrity, Simon Lokodo at the helm is attempting to reinstitute laws that would make homosexuality, the concealment of a known homosexual and the medical aid of those suffering from “homosexual ailments” punishable by imprisonment and death. India, on the other hand, inherited sodomy laws in its criminal code from the British Raj, laws which were not present in its history of codified or customary legal system before. The wording and structure of such laws within the commonwealth are almost universally similar. Section 377 of India’s Penal Code, for example, calls for life in prison as punishment for “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal (primarily interpreted to be homosexuality, especially sodomy, including between consenting adults),” jargon which is found within the Belizean constitution, among other Commonwealth edicts. The High Court of Delhi, however, has since struck down Section 377 as unconstitutional. India, at present, does not recognise same-sex unions of any type, though no explicit prohibition against same-sex unions currently exists.*

The case currently being addressed by the supreme court of Belize, Claim No. 668 of 2010, is posed to challenge the statute within the nation’s constitution prohibiting “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any person or animal” under penalty of “imprisonment for ten years”. What is interesting is what is found when reading the case file’s interested parties list; 

THE HUMAN DIGNITY TRUST THE INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION OF JURISTS AND THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH OF BELIZE THE BELIZE CHURCH OF ENGLAND CORPORATE BODY THE BELIZE EVANGELICAL ASSOCIATION OF CHURCHES 

Not one, not two, but three churches are listed as interested parties within the legal document responsible for the case in question, something that shines a light on how pervasive religion is in every aspect of legislature. The inclusion of the Church of England’s corporate body drives home my point of the British responsibility for such religious presence, but it is also important to note that without British imperialism, none of these churches would have existed within the sphere of Belize in the first place.

The case itself was brought forth by one Caleb Orozco, and his organization, the United Belize Advocacy Movement or UNIBAM. Their interest is to simply remove two words from the criminal code; “person or” effectively making the statute only prohibit “carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any animal.” UNIBAM has, understandably come under fire for many reasons, but at present, the biggest concern on the parts of it’s opponents (as this has become a nationally divisive and heavily discussed case) is it’s funding at the hands of foreign interest groups, which are, curiously enough, predominantly British. Pastor Stirm, UNIBAM’s most vocal opponent, will, if asked, express that these “foreign powers, with money to throw around” are attempting to “defile the morality of Belize,” a morality that he has been a large part of shaping. What’s curious is that Stirm himself is not Belizean. He is a missionary pastor from Texas with orthodox baptist leanings, railing against foreigners evangelizing their beliefs to the Belizean people. Stirm, just one, in a long line of black coated missionaries sent to spread the good word to the godless heathens near the equator cannot possibly, in his position, understand the undeniable irony of this. Neither, it would seem, can his followers who cheer on his condemnations of homosexuality and championship of “good old fashion Belizean values,” but the irony is there.

In an interview with Stephen Fry, Ugandan morality and ethics minister, Simon Lokodo said of homosexuality: “if you are advocating that, I will treat you as a destructor of Ugandan values.” Lokodo’s words are indicative of the views held by commonwealth dissenters to social change; they believe that their morals are inherently specific to their cultural group, making any foreigner attempting social change to be an invader, when in reality, these “Ugandan” or “Belizean” values were European in origin (something that is starkly obvious when juxtaposing commonwealth laws; they are all worded the same). 

The irony inherent in these circumstances are accurately represented by Pastor Stirm’s qualms with foreign aid to the side of the fence he does not sit on, and by Lokodo’s reliance on antiquated British ideals to maintain the morality of his people. These ideas, this heavy religious presence, these prejudices are dangerous fossils, long cast away by the regime that established them in the first place. The white wigs worn by justices, the pomp and circumstance of trials, these are all archaic institutions that Britain has left behind leaving these commonwealth nations to hold these and other practices to be their own, without regard for their origins, or rather, with high regard for their belief that these customs belong to them and always have. 

Belize Action, the organization of ‘church warriors’ headed by Stirm has been known to organize marches to oppose the constitutional change UNIBAM is fighting for. This is relevant because of the physical aspect it presents; a sea of locals marching down an open road holding effigies and spouting bible verses led by the stereotypical visage of imperialism; the white haired, fair skinned, male bodied, final authority. Stirm, the champion of the concept of Belizean morality not only ignores his personal origin and the origin of the legislature he is fighting to keep, but also his similarity to those imperialists who came before him. Those imperialists who decided, based off of their own personal perceptions of these savages, that their voices where necessary to lead the primitives down the path of the righteous.  

The irony in all this, is of course, lost on those blinded by their internalized Eurocentric concepts of right and wrong, those who refuse to allow their society to move forward, out of the dark shadow of prejudices handed down to them by their former oppressors. They have been left to steep in this culture for too long to understand the need for change. It is for this reason that the responsibility for assistance lies with the country that caused this trickle down aftermath.

Britain has recently enacted a movement to fund and support all organizations that move to abolish the draconian laws left behind by colonialism, and rightfully so. The repercussions of British Imperialism within the commonwealth are insurmountable and, at least within smaller nations, are almost impossible to transcend without assistance, particularly due to the fat wallets of church groups with their own agendas. In short, because it was Britain who made this mess, it is time for them to return and help pick up the pieces.

*On the 10th of December The Supreme Court of New Delhi said gay sex between consenting adults remains a criminal offence, in a major setback for the largely closeted homosexual community in India.

Gift Guide // Things I Love From Stores I Love

I've never done a post like this before, but with Christmas in the air, I just couldn't help it. Giving gifts is by far my favourite part of the season (maybe because it involves shopping), so I thought I'd put together some cozy, hyper-feminine things I fell in love with while perusing the internet this cyber Monday.

Christmas Gift Guide by samanthasingh featuring kate spade home decor

1. J.Crew End-on-end pajama set in swiss dot -  €58 // 2. J.Crew Ray-Ban® original aviator sunglasses with polarized pink lenses - €145 // 3. HUF Plantlife Crew Socks in Grey - €8,81 // 4. The lip slip® by sara happ - €18 // 5. Pearl stud earrings - €37 // 6. Twiggy Vickers Bow Bracelet from Kiel James Patrick - €29.52 // 7. H&M Body butter - €3,59 // 8. kate spade new york 2014 Desktop Spiral Calendar - €28 // 9. Chevron Knit Throw Blanket, Aqua - €145 // 10. Floss Gloss The Nail Lacquer in Pony - €5,88

My favourite among the ten? It's a tie between the jam jams and the kate spade ny planner. I can personally vouch for the planner; I'd die without mine.

Until next time!

THE AMANDALA'S COLIN BH & RAPE APOLOGISM, MISOGYNY, RACISM, GENERAL IGNORANCE

Before I begin here, let me put across a point. I am very rarely surprised and aghast at things that happen in my home country. It has reached the point of desensitisation as I believe it has for many others. That said I was completely caught off guard by yesterday's piece in 'Colin's Corner' of the Amandala. If you happen to be one of the few people who missed it, (you didn't miss much) let me refresh your memory; our ever entertaining (gag) guide into the depths of human indecency, Colin Bh regales us with his flawless perception of race, gender and rape politics.

With his insistence on the importance of "virtuous women" in society, Bh kicks off his descent into what can only be described as broad scoping and very dangerous ignorance. The entire article is a tapestry of slut shaming, victim blaming and racism stitched together with terrible semantics and bad jokes. And yet, when asked for comment on the backlash he has so far received, he doesn't understand what he's done wrong?

Well today is your lucky day, Colin. I'm here to set you straight.

Proceeding from the aforementioned necessity of virtuous women for the continued stability of nations, Bh moves that the laws recently passed were lacking the reviewal and critique of what he calls "mature sincere males" a group we can only hope he does not include himself in. Because, obviously if there are flaws in something it's because a man wasn't involved right? Separately, I would like to privately move that perhaps one of these faultlessly wise "mature sincere males" should have intervened before Bh's article was published in the first place, since it's entirely impossible that they were present in the editorial process. But I digress. Carrying on down the mountain of future material for letters of apology our faithful narrator takes us further down the rabbit hole and discusses a quaint little anecdote whose validity I cannot vouch for but nonetheless must critique:

The other day a man couldn't resist a girl with a very sexy behind, and he patted her on that part. Now, every red-blooded male in this land has, at some time, and maybe numerous times, have had to exert some major restraint around some very sexy girl. Can you believe that the man went to jail?! Sometimes I wonder wherefrom our women get their counselling. Because the sexy female in the sexy attire exerts a magnetic pull on the male (it's in our genetic code), the conscious mind does not have to tell the hands to touch. Of it's own instinctively, the hand moves. The conscious mind has to intervene and tell the hand: whoa, don't do that!

In which Colin Bh, a nationally published columnist stipulates that men are nothing but their animal desires and are entirely governed by hormones and testosterone, making the choice not to infringe upon the personal liberties of another human being something very difficult - something you should be proud you can do (because men are red-blooded animals who are hard wired to chase skirts dontchaknow!). That, to me gives men too little credit and were I on the other end of the gender spectrum, I would be furious that someone deigned to portray me in such a barbaric light. But it's in the genetic code to be a lecherous perv, Samantha! No. It's not. There is no genetic excuse to support the pat on the back you want to give yourself for respecting someone. You don't get a cookie for not grabbing a strangers ass. You don't get a trophy for exhibiting basic human decency. It's not hard to not molest someone and if it really is that hard for anyone, their continued presence in society is terrifying.

Of course it is not our right to touch. The little girl is off limits and the big girl has to give permission. Yes, the male is in severe error when he doesn't resist. But why do we have to go for fine and confine? A fine is no penalty for a rich man, so that's bogus. And incarcerating a person is one of the most inhumane punishments devised by man. The punishment for touching (fondling) has to be a good LASHING.

Of course it is not your right to touch, but thank you for stating the obvious. I will grant to you your Foucauldian claim that imprisonment is an awful form of punishment, but that is all I will grant. If only we applied this type of logic to issues that were not chiefly womens'. Yeah theft is bad but prison is too serious a punishment! Yeah embezzling is bad, but they'd be able to pay the fine anyways. You know what actually is really bad? Molesting an innocent party. You know what is arguably worse? Deciding that something you have never and will never experience is not terrible enough to warrant a certain kind of punishment then proceeding to release a dangerous article about it. You know what is definitely worse than that? Involving racial 'humour' (this was an attempt at humour right?) in what was already a steaming pile of applied prejudices:

I have heard it being promulgated by some ignorant "black people" in the USA that lashing must be outlawed because it reminds of slavery. I say, lashing did not begin when slaves were taken from Mother African and brought to the New World. Aha, simple-minded "white people" in the USA are only too willing to yield to this back way thinking.

If you're still with me folks, don't you worry, it gets better - and by better I mean it slowly descends to depths you would not think possible considering that at this point, we are already far below sea level. But we are still going lower. This article was the Marianna's trench of awful, and the submarine is descending, fast.

I can't believe that some of our women believe that there is no difference between stealing a young boy and stealing a young girl. (I heard Ms. Alpuche discussing this matter). I am sorry to be rude to our beautiful women, but unu noh di mek sense ya. I challenge them to find and present the parents who would say if they were faced with the decision of having their 12-year-old son molested by a thirty-year-old woman or their 12-year-old daughter molested by a thirty-year-old man, "give up the girl." It is impossible that these crimes carry the same penalty. 

Rape is the most heinous of crimes and deservedly carries severe penalties.

But the rape of a male by a male is more heinous than the rape of a female by a male. Consider that (1) the female might one day fall in love with the male; (2), the female provoked the immature/crazy male to commit this act; (3), it is a natural act; 94), the female might be entirely whorish, so the act is of little consequence.*

If I were to change one thing about this article it would be to black out everything but that one line,"rape is the most heinous of crimes and deservedly carries severe penalties." This, Bh, is the only thing you got right, the only thing you didn't manage to cook the goodness out of using one part ink and two parts ignorance. This is the only thing you did not ruin.

But then you follow it with rape apologism used to support a theory that was homophobic at best, and then here I am, ripping my hair out trying to understand what kind of person writes these things down and doesn't immediately rip up the paper, what kind of person thinks these things and doesn't try to just forget it, and worse than that, what kind of editors would read this filth and deem it suitable for mass consumption. Because you and the editors who allowed your garbage to be published are hallmarks of the institutionalised misogyny that permeates every facet of culture in Belize. You prove that even the media supports this disgusting way of thinking and you exemplify why it will continue to be unsafe for women in our country because when the media at one of it's highest levels appears to promote violence against women, what is safe?

Rape is rape and rape is heinous. It doesn't matter how many sexual partners the victim had beforehand, it doesn't matter if the victim is male or female (although the statistics prove that female rape is more of an endemic), it doesn't matter how she dresses, it doesn't matter if the rapists thinks she was "provoking him." If a crime is visited upon an innocent party, and your response is to tell the woman that she was "entirely whorish, so the act is of little consequence," then Colin Bh, my rebuttal is simple; you are entirely ignorant, so the act of me bashing in your skull is of little consequence.

If the Amandala wishes to remain a respected media outlet and salvage what little respect is still allocatable for them they will sever all ties with columnist Colin Bh, because unless they wish to have themselves forever aligned with someone who believes that there are any positive results possible from rape of any kind there is no other option. It is dangerous to allow someone to publish ideas that could even slightly (though there was nothing slight about Bh's tirade) seem to be supporting violence against women. Keeping him on would both be a terrible business move and socially irresponsible. In any other country, Bh would have already been booted out the door upon his first draft reaching the spell checker. This man no longer deserves his soap box. It's time to take it away.

Hey, because of space constraints I will withhold my comments on the penalties for sex with an underage person until next week.

Here's hoping we never have to hear what he thinks about sex with a minor. That's all up to you, Amandala.

*bolded for emphasis