No more bullshit

Bullshit, bullshit was the cry from the audience which cheered after Robert Carr's closing presentation in the panel "MSM, HIV and Activism : Key Questions and Strategies for Moving Forward" in the closing plenary of the MSM Pre-conference.

We in the Caribbean have had many internationally renowned orators.. Burnham, Eric Williams, Rodney ..  Robert's passion and "righteous anger as panel moderator Stephen Lewis put it , came over succinctly in the history of those great Caribbean orators, in Robert's call for no more bullshit.

The remarks focussed on :-

1. Bullshit was the word used to describe the provision of peer education workshops and workshops "using dildos to show how to put on condoms" while other sections of the Government - police, social services, education services discriminated against MSM are not the signs of any Government's activities to addressing the needs of MSM. 
2. Bullshit was the word used to describe the politicians' acceptance that homophobia was equivalent to nation building, and that homosexuality was a western imposition, and that homosexuals were not citizens
3. Bullshit was the word used to describe the UN's slow movement to invest in programmes that directly targetted MSM,and their complicit avoidance of the homophobia in the Government partners - even though the UN is committed to good governance, democracy and human rights.
4. Bullshit was the word used to describe the expectation that civil society activists who are providing services and advocating for MSM must work as volunteers. The call was made for independent funds for Civil Society organisations.

Robert asked the plenary to acknowledge the work done by the representatives from Jamaica AIDS Support and JFLAG . He used the Stand for Silence as way to emphasise and celebrate the "committment of the spirit to the science of overcoming the impossible"