Great Divide: Haiti to DR
The nature of the videos truly depict a story that we haven’t seen, how they became two worlds. I don’t think I had prior knowledge of Haiti and DR being bordering nations prior to this video so that was definitely something new to me. I hear all the time about how people go to visit the DR on vacation and why wouldn’t they. The nation is lush with fauna, well patrolled, and the market for selling and buying goods is booming. But at the cost of the well being of those right next door. The video shows an interesting event that they had experienced while traveling, and I used the term interesting versus surprising. The host is traveling along with other Haitian natives and as they reach certain checkpoints, it’s only him and two others who get their documents checked because they were “the darkest people on the bus”. Everything always seems to boil down to complexion, as superficial as it may be, it’s the first thing you see and apparently the defining point of character for most.
-They get tossed to the side and beat and killed. Being held up at the border to enter the market so that the Dominicans can have first pick and their spots to buy and sell. I’ll say this particular topic of discussion of Haiti hits closer for me because a few years back, my family had hosted a Haitian exchange student in our home for a year. I’ll be honest and say I wasn’t the fondest of her but I was also 11 years old already being the youngest sibling, so only so much to say at that time. But never did I know this was her reality back home. Home where she left her parents and brothers to be able to go to school here.
- The nature of the video is informative in a documentary style format. It’s short and sweet to say the least however it pulls a mass amount of history and context in a small amount of time. Whereas the other video goes on a deeper dive.
The two cultures Haitian and Dominican, are both considered Afro-Latin however because one perceives a darker complexion than the other, it’s almost instinctive to disregard them.
I truly feel that Haiti and the DR has been divided for many years now and if we do not stop the noise, it will continue. The government started this horrible situation and they have done many things to keep their feet on the neck of Haitians. I do feel that the world is very afraid of Haiti, and they do not want to ever see this group or any black people to ever rise up again and succeed. The pure fear is so evident that you can smell it.
It is crazy how the media has the two separated with them being so close. The media shared the beauty of the DR and shows the bad poor side of Haiti. Haiti has a beautiful island and should be talked about more.