“The level of inequality is so overwhelming that it now touches people’s lives in a scope and expansiveness that we have not seen in a long time ... since the gilded age in America” — Henry Giroux (McMaster University Canada)

“The data is telling us that Bermuda’s young Black men and boys are in a zone more dangerous than war zones across the world. The most recent murders took place execution-style within a block of our main police station” — Vic Ball (former senator)

The sheer magnitude of the horror that has befallen our young marginalised Black male population and its impact by extension on their mothers and other loved ones is still for most incomprehensible.

As I was beginning to write this on September 16, news arrived at 5.40pm that another Black Bermudian was shot. The assailant fired a barrage of bullets in the colonial capital of Bermuda on Court Street, only 25 metres from where the prior murders occurred some weeks earlier. Sadly, the victim, Janae Minors was a woman and a mother. I extend my condolences to her family.

I often hear that Bermudians want solutions as if there is some short cut. The bad news? Sometimes there are no short cuts. We are at a point where we have to embrace a new gospel or conventional wisdom, as the old one is no longer credible. You know it and I know it.

This issue is profoundly systemic in nature as the facts confirm. It’s simply insulting to these parents to endure the levels of victimisation that they routinely endure, especially coming from Black political and financial elites who are complicit and have presided over this societal failure on both sides of the aisle.

A quick recap ...

I outlined in my previous piece on the causation at work in relation to the recent murders of those two young Black men on August 12, and of the types of adverse impacts of living in a society where income and wealth inequality continue to rise unabated. In Bermuda, its epicentre is the international business sector. This cannot be ignored if you are determined to bring about the right long-term solutions as opposed to some simple-minded mantra.

Yet it does present a paradox because IB is also the prime driver of this economy, albeit one we are overly dependent upon. Both things can be true, however — it is a reality that we must face. Let me repeat a few of those adverse impacts once again which are most affecting those at the bottom of income distribution — low-income to lower-middle-income households — and which for the most part only redistributive public policies can address:

• Poor educational outcomes

• Growth of an illicit economy usually in relation to the trade in narcotics and other drugs

• Gang formation and gang violence

• Growth in poverty, real and relative

• Growth of capital crimes (murder)

• Stagnant wages (a big one!)

• Rise in the cost of living

That last item has little adverse impact for those who represent the top 10 per cent in terms of earnings, and who are benefiting from the high levels of income and wealth inequality.

They pay consequently relatively nothing in taxes in Bermuda with its regressive tax regime — although for those at the bottom of income distribution, disproportionately Black Bermudians, their standard of living steadily continues to decline.

Our middle class in other words is eroding right before your eyes.

Who will tell me that is not what we have been witnessing in Bermuda since the dawn of the 21st century?

The United Nations Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs had this to say about the state of inequality in Bermuda as of May 2022: “... Income inequality continues to grow in Bermuda and, when coupled with the territory’s regressive taxation system and high cost of living, creates ripe conditions for economic deprivation and poverty.”

As with most other stats, just dig under the surface and one will find that the racial disparity in relation to poverty in Bermuda is as wide as the Great Sound. Take a look at the colour-coded maps illustrated in the brilliant report put out two years ago by the former Chief Medical Officer, Ayoola Oyinloye. That report was buried by David Burt, the Premier, and health minister Kim Wilson for the sin of not ignoring the racial disparities as it relates to health.

Yes, I said it. For not ignoring the obvious racial disparities around health in Bermuda.

A necessary recap

Why, in our multiracial society, are mayhem and murder disproportionately concentrated in Black communities and low-income households? Because relatively high levels of income and wealth inequality have their most adverse impacts on those at the bottom of income distribution as stated — significantly the most grave impact of murder.

Disproportionately in Bermuda they are overwhelmingly Black Bermudians.

Inasmuch as we live in a multiracial, colonial society where Whites — mostly Anglo-Saxon and Portuguese — represent 31 per cent of the population, have you asked yourself why we have not witnessed proportionately the same adverse impacts upon that segment of our community? Including the deadliest one?

Did the Governor or Michael Weeks face this question the other night at the town hall? There was a packed hall of Black Bermudians and, according to sources, about 12 Whites were in attendance. That figure included the Governor, I might add.

The answer? In a society where the presence of income and wealth inequality is ubiquitous and growing, White Bermudians and residents have higher levels of income and multigenerational wealth on average to more fully insulate them from the worst of those adverse impacts in a society where high levels of income and wealth inequality are present.

The same cycle is repeating itself

I vividly remember appearing on television newscasts when we were experiencing an orgy of gang-related violence in the period between 2007 and 2012. It seems that most Bermudians seem to have forgotten that even more deadlier cycle.

In doing those news media interviews, I routinely reached a point when I would add that if we did not face and address the underlying causation at work here which was producing these lethal outcomes and put in place the right public policies, the five, seven and 11-year-olds would grow up to take their place in this deadly dance a decade later.

So said, so done — with the deepest of regrets.

Let us not forget that the 23-year-old and the 18-year-old victims in August would have been 8 and 3 respectively in 2010. The two men arrested in relation to the murders are now aged 21 and 16. In 2010, they would have been 6 and 1. Similarly, the two young Black men charged with the murder of Ms Minors are both 24, while another arrested without charge thus far is 19. They would have been 9 and 4 in 2010.

Societal and political failure

This is telling of the degree of governmental and societal failure of Black political and financial elites, and White indifference to the say the least. Both governments during that period dropped the ball and destroyed the hopes of many.

In other words — and I want Andrew Murdoch, the Governor, to hear this — we cannot brake this cycle by arresting ourselves out of this or incarcerating ourselves out of this. Nor can we prosecute ourselves out of this crisis that ring-fences our Black communities and the low-income households within them.

Governor, that is the part Mr Weeks intentionally left out while pointing the finger at parents. Bermuda, this is not the solution despite what the British colonial governor and David Burt have told you.

These cycles will continue. Public safety? Yes. Who can say no to that? It is essential. But a long-term solution? No. Causation and proper-based solutions that flow from that are found elsewhere whence the Governor, Mr Weeks and the One Bermuda Alliance fear to tread.

Did you not notice how they ran as fast as they could, even from Vic Ball’s devastating indictment? A heartbreaking piece that illustrated the sheer horror facing many of our young Black men. All of this inasmuch as the victims and the perpetrators seem to be getting younger and younger.

To the extent that these murder sprees and the poverty swamp in which they occur can be reined in, the following is the only path we must take. And, more specifically, that is to implement a robust set of redistributive public policies that will tackle the problem where it originates — which I do not see coming from the Tax Commission or this government.

A least not the types of redistributive public policies that are big enough to arrest the magnitude of this present crisis in Black Bermuda, and thus Bermuda in general. Rest assured the Black community is in an ever-deepening socioeconomic crisis that springs directly from the continuous expansion in international business over the past few decades.

In part two, I will explore the only path to the solutions that will give Bermuda a fighting chance in restoring equity and real fairness to this society. Not the fake kind that Mr Burt peddles, but redistributive public policies that would raise our standard of living as opposed to seeing it continue to decline.

• Rolfe Commissiong was the independent candidate for Pembroke Central (Constituency 17) in the 2025 General Election