J’adore Haiti and the case for Universal Humanity

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Haiti’s been on my mind alot lately. If I had to count, then we’re talk­ing a year of wak­ing thoughts where I never wanted to for­get that there was a Haiti or a Hait­ian peo­ple at home and abroad.

My first post on Dasheen, a love let­ter to my own dear St. Kitts felt so right to me, and beyond that I just knew that the next needed to be post-marked directly to Haiti. I don’t know why I imag­ined that such a let­ter needed to come straight from the heart of a native Hait­ian. I guess you learn as you go.

Yet, this is not a love let­ter per se. This is just my heart and mind con­verg­ing. I wrote down my thoughts yes­ter­day dur­ing an all day Fundrais­ing and Stew­ard­ship ses­sion (how apt) at my place of work. I didn’t know I would post it, but it feels right and timely.

Per­mit me, as this wants to go far beyond any kind of cul­tural con­ver­sa­tion. It is a human con­ver­sa­tion and as I lis­tened to morn­ing radio this week Jef­fery “cousin Jeff” John­son summed it up nicely as he stated matter-of-factly: “What we need right now is uni­ver­sal humanity.”

I’ve always heard that I’m part of the ‘me” gen­er­a­tion. The con­note is neg­a­tive and I don’t sub­scribe. I don’t run in those cir­cles and nei­ther do the men and women who I stud­ied with, who ran into the smoke and fire of a 9–11 with­out a clue or safety net. The lat­ter in the face of NYPD and FDNY, and even those that with good rea­son were run­ning for saftety in the oppo­site direction.

I’ve also heard that I’m a part of the “right now” gen­er­a­tion. Also a neg­a­tive cam­paign, but I’m about to turn a neg­a­tive into a pos­i­tive for the pur­poses of this post and wher­ever else it suits.

I AM SO SICK AND TIRED OF HAITIAN SUFFERING. Yes, I am aware that there are any num­ber of causes and peo­ple and places that need ‘right-now’ atten­tion. I am aware that the world over, includ­ing present home and hearth, there are preesing to over­whelm­ing needs.  Although nowhere, other than Haiti, do I some­times hear and won­der if those needs are insur­mount­able.  I am aware that there may be any num­ber of ref­er­en­dums on the table (one can hope).

How­ever, I am also aware that among other things, Haiti is not sexy.

That is not a slight. I’ve worked in and around the non-profit world more than any other indus­try, and it is a busi­ness, albeit one that gets the ben­e­fit of a sup­posed beat­ing heart. So my work in the non-profit world has led me to one of many truths: in order to adopt a place and make its peo­ple and causes your own, in order to walk to D.C. and beat the pave­ment on any street, in order to get folks to move when they want to retreat, the cov­er­age must be relent­less, the youth must get loud and orga­nized at the same time, and above all else the cause must be sexy. Sex sells and there is absolutely, unequiv­o­cally noth­ing hot­ter than a sexy cause that some­one can wear embla­zoned across a tee.

I am not figt­ing mechan­ics here.  I am work­ing the system.

Africa is sexy. Whether that has ulti­mately worked to the good of those on the ground, I don’t know.  I would direct any one aten­tion to the insights of Author and Econ­o­mist, Dambisa Moyo and her book Dead Aid.  You be the judge there.  But in my opin­ion, folks love African causes. For bet­ter or worse Africa is sexy.

Now, a very good friend, who is also not a Hait­ian native asked me one time: How can we make Haiti sexy?

I’m usu­ally a quick draw, but I needed time to think on this, and then I real­ized I need to talk about it to myself in the mir­ror, and then I needed to talk and eat and chill with some young Haitians who felt that knot for Haiti in their verey stom­achs, and then I needed to write about it and then and only then, I needed to get loud.

Haiti is my choice and not just for today.

We are a multi-tasking gen­er­a­tion. We love to put that in our resumes, whether it is the case or not. We can walk and chew gum at the same time for what­ever that’s worth. We’re all damned if as younng peo­ple we can’t fig­ure out some­thing for this sov­er­eign island nation, that while in the pit has never begged for mercy or the exe­cu­tioner, but who deserves the first with our unmit­i­gated fer­vor and undi­vided atten­tion as if they were our babies, our moth­ers, our fathers, our sis­ters, our brothers…

I meet next week with a some­one at my job who is proudly Hait­ian, and who has done much to edu­cate inter­nally and is also active exter­nally to find out what she would have me do before I go out of my mind with Haiti.

With­out a doubt, I need to do something!

Then maybe, after I have done all I can do, I can let Haiti go. Until then, bear with me, join me.

What can we do to impact Haiti imme­di­ately and longterm?

Below are some sto­ries that helped me along today as I wrote this:

• Haiti 1 Year After the Earthquake
• Haiti: A Year Later; Chil­dren Still Suffering
• AJWS: On the Ground in Haiti (I’m par­tial, but I love an org that does what it says it will do and just tells it like it is)

This is why I KNOW and BELIEVE the YOUTH is where its at!