“Bearing Witness”

Agency is the personal ability to act or to do something. A person’s capacity to act upon a situation or issue. I believe that everyone has a choice in what they want to do and who they want to be. I think that my persaverance, will to succeed and self-motivation has brought me to where I am today, as a college student. I think this whole idea of agency is definitely a concept about self-awareness and knowing what it is that is going on around you and how it affects you and understanding what it is YOU can do to make things better. This also applies on a larger scale of people who have the choice to serve their communities, and again understanding the situations and circumstances at hand and having the agency to help in some way.

Structural Violence is a ‘new kind of theodicy, a cultural inquiry into the ways that people attempt to explain the presence of pain, affliction and evil in the world.’ With this said, geographic location plays a critical role as to why personal agency is affected through this idea of structural violence. Farmer states that, ‘in Haiti, AIDS and political violence are two leading causes of death among young adults. These afflictions are not the result of accident or a force majeure they are a consequence, direct or indirect, of human agency’. Haiti is a land full of hope, yet due to lack of essential resources needed on a daily basis, poverty is prevalent, basic freedoms are taken away, disease has impacted a majority of the population and the life expectancy at birth is less than 50 years of age. “Haiti is a country where political and economic forces have structured risk for AIDS, tuberculosis and indeed, most other infectious and parasitic diseases”; further hunger, torture and rape are also common.

With this said, Farmer goes on to say that, ‘when the Artibonite Valley was flooded, depriving families like the Josephs of their land, a human decision was behind it; when the Haitian army was endowed with money and unfettered power, human decisions were behind that, too.’ Farmer is conveying that HUMAN agency is simply the cause of these travesties that happened to Chouchou Louis and Acephie Joseph. Farmer states, “these grim biographies sugest that the social and economic forces that have helped to shape the AIDS epidemic are, in every sense, the same forces that led to Chouchou’s death and to the large repression in which it was eclipsed.’ “These individuals were ‘at risk’ of such a fate long before they met the soldiers who altered their destinies.” This is a profound statement by Farmer who suggests that the root cause of these two deaths were linked, in every sense. ‘They were both victims of structural violence — processes and forces that conspire, whether through routine, ritual, or the hard surfaces of life, to CONSTRAIN agency.’

Farmer addresses that these two individuals were ‘CONSTRAINED’ of their personal agency. They were not given the choice to do right for themselves, simply because they were stripped of basic rights (by the military) and were forced to make decisions based on their situations. They were punished in a way that caused their personal suffering and Farmer goes on to say that understanding the ‘extreme suffering’ of these people and how they were victims of structural violence is a result of 3 reasons:

1. The ‘exoticization’ of suffering is lurid as that endured by Acephie and Chouchou distances it. ‘The suffering of individuals whose lives and struggles recall our own tends to move us; the suffering of those who are ‘remote’, whether because of GEOGRAPHY or CULTURE is often less affecting’
2. “Knowledge of suffering cannot be conveyed in pure facts and figures, reportings that objectify the suffering of countless persons. The horror of suffering is not only its immensity but the faces of the anonymous victims who have little voice, let alone RIGHTS, in history”
3. The dynamics and distribution of suffering are still POORLY understood. Physicians when fortunate, can alleviate the suffering of the sick. But explaing its distribution requires many minds and resources. Case studies of individuals reveal suffering, they tell us what happens to on or many people; but to EXPLAIN suffering, one must embed individual biography in the larger matrix of CULTURE, HISTORY, and POLITICAL ECONOMY.

These three reason embody Farmer’s message to us. Geographic location and history are two critical components into understanding structural violence and its impact on the people of Haiti. It is also evident that Farmer wants us to look at the extreme suffering of these individuals on a larger scale, in a larger context; suggesting that economic and social factors DICTATE the lives of people in Haiti. It dictates their LIFE choices, their personal agency, and through this, we can understand their suffering.

Further, racial inequality and gender roles also fit into the bigger scheme of structural violence. I want to highlight this point in Acephie’s case, who was a very poor woman and had this idea of a better life with a soldier who were they only people paid on salary. Once Acephie became pregnant, the soldier didn’t want anything to do with her and Acephie is left to raise the child on her own, only to find out that she has AIDS and her baby as well. Acephie’s personal agency was taken away as a result of this disease and further because of her poor status in life, she was forced into a domestic life, that did not treat her right. Acephie was a beautiful woman who was just seen as another ‘partner’ for this soldier. Because she was a WOMAN, her basic rights as a human were pretty much non-existent because women are not seen as equal to men in this country. Which resonates back to gender inequality that is still seen around the world today, and is of course more prevalent in Haiti as seen here in Acephie’s case.

I think what Farmer and Stevenson are trying to say is what is INSIDIOUS is blaming Haitian ‘culture’ as to why violence, hunger and poverty are evident. That it is simply in ‘their nature’ to be tortured or people torturing others is why it is happening and as a result is the cause of suffering and impacts moral dignity. Again, this is similar to what Landson-Billing’s was arguing that we cannot assume about one’s ‘culture’. We must understand experience and the deeper history of these people, which ties back to the idea of human agency and ties back to structural violence as a whole. Further, they go on to say that, ‘the task at hand, if this silence is to be broken, is to identify the forces conspiring to promote suffering, with the understanding that these are differentially weighted in different settings’.

This is NOT a ‘cultural’ thing and that cannot be blamed. It is insidious to do so. We have to understand that eveeryon goes through pain and suffering but not everyone goes through the same kind. The extreme suffering that is happening in Haiti in particular brings to light the abuse of human rights. These are PEOPLE. People who are entitled to BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS such as freedom and having enough resources to survive. Not only that, but the moral dignities of these people are negative impacted. Further, it is stated that, ‘Culture’ does not explain suffering; it may at worst furnish an alibi.’ Meaning that ‘cutlure’ is not an explanation for suffering nor is it an explanation of malicious acts being done by people to others. Everyday, there is a violation of social and economic rights and blaming their ‘culture’ is unacceptable. People who live in Haiti are mostly stripped of their personal agency and they accept this life that they have no choice but to live and more importantly, survive. This assesment of how this is just ‘their way of life’ is not valid.

Farmer and others have argued that “culture” tends to ignore the issue of power and the consideration of history. “Culture” is ASSUMED to make sense, as a whole, but “culture” does not help us to recognize, analyze and criticize the histories of oppression and injustice which are present realities or the dynamics of power and inequality in the present moment.

“Culture” is used to try to justify what should properly be understood as abuses of power. Abuses toward the system and provides explanations that refer to “culture” that fail to acknowledge the histories of colonialism, military conquest, economic exploitation, and political repression.

The social structure in place that perpetuate inequality is lack of resources at my sight. Although there are snacks and technologies provided, it is limited. It cannot accommodate every single student.Their time is limited their as well and some students have a hard time getting to and home from the sight. Parent involvement is a huge factor at Canal Alliance to contribute to the success of the student. I feel that they have an amazing program and they do their absolute best to get the parents involved and steer their students in the right direction, but lack of help and volunteers can hurt the process and thats why volunteers are very helpful. There are so many kids that go to the Canal Alliance sight and I can see how comfortable they are there. I see a lot of tutors and mentors, but any extra help, HELPS the students. One on one time really helps them focus in better and I can see that they feel right at home. But, their socioeconomic status and other problems at home can affect the way they think and feel, even at a place like Canal Alliance where tremendous support and tools are available to help them succeed, it is overwhelming for the student if they are dealing with others stresses. My first session at canal, there was this girl who was texting a boy apparently, I wasn’t helping her specifically, but she was sitting next to me while I was tutoring my student. After some time, I saw her crying and I’m not sure exactly as to why, but I think it was because of the boy she was texting. These students are dealing with everyday stresses at home and the stress of academic pressure as well as dealing with their bodies changing and growing up altogether and all of this can be overwhelming and hinder the student’s success.