Can you imagine? ..... “picture it” as the character Sophia in that nineties comedy she would say in Golden Girls, a woman in her twenties who lives in western Jamaica with relatives and present as a stud aesthetically meaning she wears some unisexual or sometimes male attire such as shirts, shoes and jeans and she is repeatedly told she needs to wear female attire and look girly/feminine as it is offensive. Worse yet she smokes weed; the anathema for some relatives as she is described as a ‘flex like a man’ or buying into the hyper-masculine ideal and Jamaican gangsterism ideal.
She is constantly harassed in particular by a male cousin verbally at first but then things start to get far more physical than usual with more threats and finger pointing in her face etc. The Montegonian had to endure this mounting pressure for some time until the moment when one cracks comes as it did with her; one such tersely worded exchange presented itself over a month ago and she decided to have none of it, especially owing to the fact she is small in stature and deemed defenceless if and when she is man handled or at least that what her male cousin aggressor thought.
An argument ensued which led to a tussle between the two where she warned him to desist but he persisted in a drive to impose his will on her to change both her mode of dress, actions and lack of male friends or so he thought. A struggle developed and after several shoves, harsh words and a temporary standoff a knife was brought into the picture wherein upon the male cousin’s break in his retreat the woman defended herself with the device that she uses to shred her weed or marijuana stash after purchase. The cousin was stabbed and she then fled from the scene and headed straight to the police station to make the report; however much to her dismay she was instead taken into custody and served a week in a jail cell for simply defending herself. The cousin suffered a stab wound but not fatally and since then things have only gotten worse in terms of the relationship with not only him but other family members and strangers who got wind of the incident. Since then she has been effectively bouncing from pillow to post. The cops said she was wrong to have stabbed the man but instead made a report of the earlier challenges and even suggestions by one officer of her taking a reparative course from her ‘lifestyle’
Charges have not been filed by the cousin although reports suggest he is being encouraged to pursue same instead he is reported to be making threats and what he intends to do when he sees her; strong suggestion of violence presents itself here and that this is by no means over. The cops took the report and she was advised to follow it up. She also made a report to APJ from which flows this entry on the matter. This business of displacements and no real answer to same is disturbing me again as expressed in previous entries and we are told by agencies that have couch surfing avenues which actually turn out to be few and far in between and for young MSM/transgender mostly and not lesbians. Thankfully some forward thinking women have been opening up their doors as evidenced in a previous post on an arson attack earlier this year and the various assistance in sheltering at the community level. Other SGL groups seem more interested in image building on social media more than actually assisting persons in cases such as this even with clearly more resources than other outfits they instead refer to the referral route when such cases come by their radar.
The woman has tried to avoid being seen in the area although she is trying to relocate both her person and belongings and avoid taking phone calls from some family members as the tone of the conversation she is well aware of. She has also been talking to a counselor I have also learned. Hope remains while company is true and thankfully this one did not escalate into something else.
Peace & tolerance
H
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