18500: Pierre Jean: Re: 18429: erzilidanto: The meaning of being Haitian, identify with Haitians and Haitian culture (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Pierre Jean <pierrejean2004@yahoo.com>


> From: Erzilidanto@aol.com
>
> "When a Haitian
>
> citizen of foreign origin (especially Lebanese or
>
> Syrian) is viewed as an "enemy" then all of a sudden
>
> he becomes an "Arab". Never mind the fact that the
>
> vast majority of them are at least third-generation
>
> Haitian."
>
> Whoever wrote this is stretching the truth again.
> Haitians have been
> referring to Haitians of Syrian or Lebanese
> extraction as "Arab" way before 9/11 gave
> that word a terrorist coding. It goes back at least
> the 1920s if not before
> in our Haitian history. So Writer, please get your
> facts straight about Haitian
> culture.

Clearly, you did not understand the context of my
post. I meant "enemy" in Haiti, not in the United
States. The words from people like Randall Robinson,
Dany Fabien (chief of staff of Jean-Gerard Dubreuil,
Pere Yvon Massac and the like) are very clear. They
are basically that these so-called "Haitians of
light-skin complexion and foreign origin" are the
enemy of the Haitian people.

If you had taken the time to read my post correctly -
and I stayed in the Haitian context since that is one
of the rules of the Corbett list - you would have
understood that I never once meant anything about the
US or the pre/post 9/11 situation in that country.

Finally, I never said that these people are not of
Middle Eastern origin. What I am saying very clearly
is that they have lived in Haiti for at least three
generations in most cases, they carry Haitian
passports, yet when troubled times erupt, all of a
sudden, we are talking about "these foreigners, these
Sysrians, these Lebanese."

Maybe all of us "true" Haitians have a bit of racist
or Middle-Eastern-phbic blood in us, shouldn't we say?

So, Ms. Laurent, please get your facts straight.

Thank you.

Pierre Jean.

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