Falmouth Community participates in Controversial Conversations and Coffee for Black History Month

On Thursday Night , The BIPOC Network hosted their first ever event in celebration of Black History Month, titled ‘Controversial Conversations and Coffee’, the evening opened up well needed conversations about Black Identity, Colonialism, Immigration and White Privilege between audience members and a selective panel. The event, hosted at the Cornish Bank brought together a diverse group of people of all ages who are passionate about the celebration of cultures, combating racial inequality and helping the community of Falmouth to become a more inclusive space.

The BIPOC Network is an organisation for students, staff and allies at the Universities of Exeter and Falmouth and the FXPlus to come together to create a safe space where Black, Indigenous and People of Colour feel supported and valued. They also help to provide a voice for ethnic minority people in the local community and offer advice and resources to better support these individuals.

BIPOC Network’s founder and the organiser of the event Athena wanted to create the event because she personally didn’t know how to answer some of the questions and was intrigued to see how other people would answer them: “Two of my housemates are black, and the question ‘how do you refer to a black person?’… I’m quite comfortable with the terminology, but I felt like down here some people felt uncomfortable about using the word black. I know it’s quite a stigmatised topic and I wanted to know what people thought and to get conversation started.”

She also stated that, “I really wanted to get the community involved, I wanted to introduce these ideas and these concepts, like White Privilege into the community because I feel like a lot of people didn’t know or understand these quite crucial things about black history because it is Black History Month, so topics like Black Identity, the Windrush, Immigration and also amnesia, like forgetting about it, I thought were quite important and they were really intense topics but I wanted to get people talking about this.”

As October is Black History Month, the panellists started the evening’s discussions by stating their own personal views and what it means to them; Charity and Community worker Clinton Sealy stated “I don’t like black history month because for 11 months of the year we’re not important, to me it’s commercial. I see discrimination every day, people see a black face when I walk out of the door. What happens at the end of October? Do people forget about black issues? I would be happy when we have these conversations on a daily basis, in school, university, church, monarchy, government.” He then later went on to say, “It’s been taken, ‘Disney-fied’, objectified. I’m on the fence about it. I don’t want to be put in a box for one part of the month.”. Another panellist, Michael Kabasele, a poet from Gobjaw Poetry Collective said, “I’m young, I’m 19. My first experience with BHM was in school. When I moved to Cornwall and then Cambridge, it’s like it gets brought up when people want to look good, but also when people want to learn.”

The floor then opened to the audience to discuss a range of questions surrounding Black Identity, the first being ‘What is White Privilege?’. One audience member stated, “I have privileges that mean that mean people see me as white, I avoid discrimination, micro aggressions, hostile speech, more likely to get a better education, treatment in hospitals…’, another responded that “’the barriers that are in place that limit the capabilities some people have. Some people will never have to think about the colour of their skin or the way their hair is. Integral things like that is what it is, micro versions that happen day to day”.

The second question, ‘Why is it a bad thing to say, ‘I don’t see colour’?’, brought more varied responses: “Because it ignores the fact that people have faced prejudices/ discriminations against them for the colour of their skin. This is something that does need to be acknowledged, rather than overlooked or dismissed as irrelevant”. Another audience member stated “What we’re saying is, would we say that to a non-white person? No. We do see colour. It was rare in Cornwall to see anyone of colour, the university has perhaps made this part of Cornwall one of the most diverse. I see good people and bad people, of any creed.”

BIPOC Network’s founder Athena, then shared her own personal feelings about being a Person of Colour in Cornwall, “I’m very conscious of my skin, I’m different to everyone. I feel that down here, I am conscious of my colour when I go outside. Sometimes when I go out in society I don’t want to be seen. I just want to be a uni student; I don’t want to be a brown girl. Sometimes I struggle with the phrase, like they don’t see me. This doesn’t mean I’m not proud of where I’m from. I’m on the fence about it.”. This inspired other people in the panel to share their experiences and feelings on the subject, Clinton Sealy stated, “The thing about this, when people say it to you, they’re not comfortable about race. I love telling people I’m black. When I came to Cornwall I loved it, because I saw another black face and I’d be like ‘hi’. Until we get proud of who we are, we can’t expect anyone to accept us. When you think black is beautiful, you don’t care anymore.”

The final question of the first segment of the evening was ‘How do you refer to a Black person?’, the majority of audience responses were confused as to why someone should be referred to as Black in the first place, and why most white people are not instantly described by the colour of their skin. Clinton Sealy then added to this point by responding, “I like to think people will refer to me by name. People don’t think I’m from here, they don’t think I can be because I’m black… You wouldn’t do that to a White person. That’s another form of white privilege.”. Another panellist gave her experience with the use of the word ‘Black’: “I grew up in Cornwall, and before the uni, I was racialised as black. I started to question the place I was taking up as Black. I met two light skinned men who instantly referred to me as black. I have multiple different heritages. Because of systemic internalised racism, when I walk into places, I do see people as black.”

After reflecting on these questions, the audience were then treated to a poetry reading from panellist Michael Kabasele, who shared her poems ‘This is my Goddamn Home’ and ‘Patriot’. Both poems captivated the audience’s attention and showed them an insight into Kabasele’s struggles navigating today’s world as a Black woman[..2] . After the reading she shared her views about decolonising history: “The realisation that a colonised history leads to a present colonial thought pattern. Racism existing in its most violent and obvious forms. It doesn’t mean that racism has gone away just because we don’t see what happened in the past around us now. We can’t pretend that these are past problems, or that we’re a ’post racial society’. The wider context in which now is being placed, cannot be ignored.”

For the final segment of the evening, the audience reflected on the Wind Rush story and scandal and what we can learn from it today. Panellist Clinton Sealey, whose parents were part of the Wind Rush generation, shared his own personal story and views: “My parents believed they were British citizens, that they would be welcome from Barbados. When they got here, they experienced racism, poor housing, job opportunities, healthcare, Policing. They suddenly realised they were doing dead end jobs, despite being educated, my parents were teachers and ended up driving buses, being housewives. Didn’t have people to support them, it was cold, hostile. When we talk about immigration we talk about hostile environments, they needed people after the war because they had a shortage of Labour. But we were treated like dogs.”

In 2017 when the scandal surfaced, it was revealed that paperwork from Windrush generation was destroyed by politicians and that most of the commonwealth citizens were treated like illegal immigrants. “It’s a scandal, done by this government, and it’ll happen again. Look at their hostile immigration policy. There’s a class war going on in immigration. We’ve opened our doors to Ukrainians, white people, but not people of colour. When it comes to black history I’m not always in favour of the month, because we need to talk about this all the time, because it’s still happening.”

“I used to work as a manager in Sainsburys in Newquay. My partner picked me up and asked if I wanted a coffee in Costa. I walked out of coaster into a ring of armed police holding guns at me. They said someone got shot in London and I fit the description. They ran my details and eventually stood down. I’d been on a 14-hour shift. It happens everywhere, this racism. When you see something that isn’t right, speak out. Unless you have these conversations these things go on.”.

The evening finished with a talk by Kate Thomas, author of ‘Collective Amnesia: Falmouth and the Transatlantic Slave Trade’. Her petition to remove a slave trader memorial in the nearby King Charles the Martyr Church was signed by most of the evenings attendees. “I grew up in Falmouth. We never really talked about the slave trade. People don’t think Cornwall was involved in it. In 2020 I first found out about the slave trader memorial in the church. My initial reaction was that I should throw paint on it. But why was is it here? Corker brought slaves with him to Falmouth. They were given as property to people. We should memorialise those people, not him. We should research our history from the perspective of the slave trade. What was Falmouth doing in it? The church tried to hide the fact they had a memorial to a slave trader.” You can read up more on Kate’s efforts and the Collective Amnesia project here: https://issuu.com/bhmcornwall22/docs/collective_amnesia_singles[..3]

An audience member shared her overall view of the event: “It was so good to see so many people, from all sorts of backgrounds, come together to chat about these topics and hear from the really interesting panel. I'd love to see more events like this, and for university societies like the BIPOC Network to be properly supported in putting them on so they can reach even more people.”

The evening left its attendees feeling empowered and inspired and gave people a lot of pride in their heritage. The organiser of the event, Athena stated, “I didn’t want to provide information, I wanted to interest people so they go out and do their own research on these topics. I wanted it to be a relaxed environment where people felt comfortable and I really think people did that night.”