Stories and News

Stories and News No. 1076 In France an inquiry into incitement to racial hatred was opened by the State prosecutor's office after the selection of Mathilde Edey Gamassou to interpret Joan of Arc in the annual festivals of Orleans was greeted by racist insults from far right social media’s users. The girl, 17 years old, whose father is from Benin and her mother is Polish, was chosen among 250 girls. " Joan of Arc was white ", says one of the most shared post, " we are white and proud to be white, don’t change our history ". Yes right, let’s not change our history... The first man on earth was not a colour . He was the earliest, although he didn’t know it, although he didn’t understand it, but it was already too much, what being human would have entailed. The very first woman to set foot on this planet was not just a colour. She was the initial one, albeit ignoring it, even though discovering every day the weight and responsibility of being a woman, be...

Stories and News No. 1020 We weren't  born racist, because, since we were kids, we’re taught to discriminate on the basis of the origins and, often and willingly, the skin colour, not only at school, but everywhere, in each plausible, influenced way . With Arithmetic : Hundreds, thousands, ten thousand, and more victims are approximated by default, down to zero value, in inverse proportion to the distance from our country of birth. In short, the more the dead are far from us and the less significant on the balance of our empathy. At the same time, one life lost by one of our fellow citizens is worth hundreds, thousands, ten thousand, and more lives beyond the boundaries of our ID. With Geography : You can say and write immigrant, illegal, foreign, stranger, in short diverse , and yet, although all of the following could at least be into one of the above categories, there is no imagination that might figure the blue eyes of a Swedish, the red hair of an Irish lady, the bl...

Stories and News No. 995 "Dad?" "Yes?" "Are you bad?" "No, I'm not, why do you say that?" "Because at school the teacher read us a story where bad kids were taken away by the Bogeyman and he is a black man. Why do you get them, Daddy, if you're not bad?" "I do not get anyone, son, that's just a fairy tale..." "But you have always told me that there are often more truths in the fables than in reality, right?" "Yes, sure... you remember everything, huh?" "I try. Am I bad too?" "Not even for a dream, son, why do you ask that?" "Dad, if bad children are taken away by the Bogeyman, the latter must be even worse than them. And if I am his son, that is, yours..." "Listen to me now carefully. Your teacher has told you a story of one Boogeyman who takes away bad children, not everyone. Are the children all bad?" "No…" "Not even ...

Stories and News No. 975 India ’s Foreign Minister has publicly condemned racist aggressions towards African students near Delhi this week. A Kenyan girl told she had been dragged down by a rickshaw and beaten by a group of men. Once upon a time there were you , them and others . Where you is us , the many, sometimes too many. Where they seem always to be more, even in the case of just one. And where others are simply others . Everything but us , you and me . I said, there were once. We talked, wrote and, above all, we read about and we saw some bad news. Uniquely beautiful and profitable to legalized misfortunes’ eaters, who used to see raising high their murky trade actions if the latest creatures of this world sadly fall on the ladder of human understanding. The most common story is simple, though enlightened words, and suggestive images too, are often futile: you , we , are intolerant and brutal, insensitive and sometimes cruel towards strangers, but you , we , shou...