Out of Many, One People: What makes a Jamaican, a Jamaican?

Being a Jamaican is more than just the colour of our skin. Being a Jamaican is a shared experience, a culture passed down from generation to generation. Being a Jamaican is a blend of all the people who came and those who were brought here by force, mixed all together to create our own unique reality.

One does not have to be black of African descent to be a Jamaican, that is not the "Jamaicanness" criteria. One Jamaican cannot tell another Jamaican that they are not Jamaican or not Jamaican enough, you do not have that right, who died and made you boss of all Jamaicans. Especially when we all live on this rock, sharing its burdens, hardship, couple gas riots and nightly merriments. Not to mention some hurricanes over the many centuries and decades. 

I cannot imagine when I was going to school with my classmates who were either Black, White, Chinese, Indians or mix up-mix up, hanging out at various parties and fetes, teen jam or on the football field, telling them they are not one of us, not part of the whole, not Jamaican enough. Seeing them now with their families, all grown up, still on the rock going through the daily grind. One cannot tell people who were born in Jamaica, grow up in Jamaica, go to school in Jamaica that they are not Jamaican. Most do not know how to be pure Chinese or Indian or Europeans, yes they respect their ancestry and are proud of the people they come from but they are Jamaicans no more and no less than any of us.   

We cannot continue to import racist American, British and European values into our society. Those societies were built on racist hate and still survives on racist hate. We must not allow Jamaicans going to these countries and experiencing racist hate, to come back to Jamaica and infect us with that hate. Injecting their unique realities into ours. The second you get to countries like the USA, UK or any EU country you immediately experience this hate because you will be defined only by the colour of your skin in these countries. In Jamaica, we have bigger fish to fry and cannot survive this carb in a barrel mentality because we are too small. We need patriotic, nationalistic unity among Jamaicans regardless of our ancestorial background. Descendance of Jamaicans born and bred in other countries and who do not have first hand knowledge or experience of being a Jamaican, you have no business telling others they are not Jamaican. The closest some of you get to Jamaica is the Jamaican restaurant on streets like Flatbush, in Brooklyn or Peckham Road, in London. I am not saying you are not Jamaican, I am saying you are not in a position to tell others they are not Jamaican. Everybody can be as Jamaican as they want to be, I care not.     

Out Of Many Cultures: The People Who Came And Stayed!

That Said! ...

The Behavior of Some Jamaicans:

92.1% of the Jamaican population are black of African descent. 6.1% of Jamaicans are considered mixed race and 0.8% are east Indians. Only 0.2% of Jamaicans are considered white. If the white population of Jamaica, grew up in Jamaica, are spread out all over the island, was educated in Jamaica, work in Jamaica and party in Jamaica, then I assume about 99.9% of their day is spent around black Jamaicans. If they only talk to and associated with other white Jamaicans, then their lives must be very lonely because with 0.2% of the population, it seems, they would go a long time before meeting another white Jamaican but that is not the case.

Observing the various social media postings of white Jamaicans, their parties, various social events, and outings and gatherings, one clearly sees that they only associate with other white or high colour people. 99.9% of who they are seen with at various social events are white. You may see the odd black Jamaican here and there, but white Jamaicans stick to each other like white on rice. 

Somehow, there always seem to be enough of them to fill a room.

I know for a fact that most of them go out of their way to preserve the racial composition of their family, their lineage and social grouping. Their intentions and purpose are not to mix with nonwhite Jamaicans, but to remain as white as possible, to preserve the bloodline. Going so far as to interbreed or import white people to copulate with. They would do almost anything other than intermarry with the black population. Yes, some families are a little more blended than others but for the most part, they remain mostly white. The 0.2% tries desperately to maintain their foothold. 

It is one thing if you are a recent migrant to Jamaica and bring your bad ways, but most of these white Jamaicans can trace their ancestry back to slavery, some are descendants of the original whip-hand colonizers. To maintain that 0.2% foothold, I am sure they are forced to indoctrinate their little offspring's on the dangers of befriending and marrying black, to the point of demonizing the local black population.

One big exception to this are white migrants to Jamaica. I find white people who were born in and grew up in other countries and cultures, who then moved to Jamaica, more likely to integrate with Jamaica’s black population, compared to white Jamaicans who have been in Jamaica for centuries. Most of these immigrants come to immerse themselves in the culture and people.  

There seems to be a greater need for Indigenous White Jamaicans to identify as white, to be on the whip-hand side of the equation and as such they go out of their way to enforce their whiteness. The same can be said for some of Jamaica's Chinese and Indian population. It is shocking when a white person from another country comes to Jamaica and tell you what some local white Jamaicans says about the local black population. 

It seems their idea of trying to be white, to fit into whiteness, involves importing racist views of the White Western World and regurgitating it back to a white person who wants none of it. I ran into this same situation several times in Jamaica. The last time was when I had some white friends from the UK vacationing in the Portie, but my friends were not having any of it and told them as much.       

White Jamaicans: In America they want everyone to acquiesce to the 1% rule. This rule basically dictates that if someone has a drop of “minority” blood in his or her body they are considered that particular ethnic group.