Death By Structural Power

October 23, 2019 7:51 AM

OluTimehin Adegbeye, writing for The Correspondent: "People die violent deaths in both the US and Nigeria – why do I fear it there and not here? Where people have little power, they become more vulnerable."

For example, a migrant’s life is exchanged for the integrity of the national border, and a citizen does not flinch. After all, he has been indoctrinated into the belief that migrant suffering and even death is acceptable as long as the idea of citizenship is preserved. Queer people, and in particular trans women, are murdered to preserve the gender binary and the superiority of masculinity within it. As their bodies are lowered into the ground, the fear and confusion of cisgender heterosexuals are also laid to rest. A girl is killed by her husband, brother, father, and the honour of the patriarchal family is restored. People like this, regularly denied access to resources or safety, are the ones our social order does not consider truly human.

The pictures accompanying the essay are from Nicolas Howalt's work Endings, a study of death in the form of the ashes that remain after the cremation of a human being.

posted by Johnny Wallflower (2 comments total)

This is a fantastic, very very clear article. Thank you for sharing it; I wouldn't have come across it.
posted by lokta at 11:59 AM on October 23, 2019

I have nothing to say about this other than it is very good.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:59 AM on October 24, 2019