We push for justice for the past, with the hope of true equality in the future.
On behalf of Pixan, AMA, and Highland Support Project, we are outraged at the story of George Floyd as yet another black death at the hands of police in the United States. We also acknowledge that this issue is bigger than one cop, one racist, or even one city. Racism is a systemic issue that has been ingrained in American history for centuries, it is not new. It is a part of our society in both obvious and subtle ways, but it has reached a tipping point, intensified by the current pandemic crisis, that we hope no one can continue to look away from.
At our organizations, we push for justice for the past, with the hope of true equality in the future. The indigenous populations we work with have faced centuries of discrimination. This racism ranges from daily discrimination against traditional indigenous dress to the violent genocide of hundreds of thousands of people from the US-backed Guatemalan government during a decades-long civil war. Indigenous people in Guatemala are not unfamiliar with protests, and there have been killings of indigenous activists as recently as 2019, which reminds us that although the civil war may be over, the struggle is not.
Mayan indigenous people protest against the government of Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales on the day he gives an address to Congress in Guatemala City, Monday.
Santiago Billy/AP
The protests in the United States have temporarily pushed news about coronavirus into the background, but both among black people in the US and indigenous people in Guatemala, COVID-19 has only further intensified underlying inequalities. In the US, black people are between two and three times more likely to be diagnosed with coronavirus than white people, and their death rates are the highest when compared to other ethnic groups. In Guatemala, where indigenous people are also more likely to suffer from underlying and preventable conditions, they are also suffering more from strict curfews and lack of public transportation that keep them from traveling into larger towns to buy food. Homes in Guatemala have begun hanging white flags outside their homes to signal a lack of food. Maya k’iche’ activist Andrea Ixchiú explains, “In a way, the flags have always been there— people are only noticing now because of the crisis. White flags have given communities in need the opportunity to visibilize a struggle against permanent inequality.”
We wish to highlight the parallels we have seen to Guatemala not to distract from racism and the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States, but to stand in solidarity. We hope our Guatemalan perspective will only add context to racism on a global scale. We are inspired by those speaking out and fighting for justice, and we will continue to do so alongside you with the hope for radical systemic change.
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Written by. Madison Sweitzer