Pictures: Youth-led Cork summit shares stories of racism

THE first youth led anti-racism summit has been held in Cork, bringing together minority and activist groups in the hopes of a future without racism.

Grassroots communities, with the support of the Children and Young People Services Committee (CYPSC) anti-racist sub-group in Cork, teamed up with marginalised youth to organise the first event of its kind in Cork.

The event, held at City Hall on Friday, invited groups to share their experiences with racism and highlighted the need to end racism in Cork.

Led by young people, the summit invited policymakers, politicians, and organisations to engage in dialogue about the impacts of racism, and to be part of the conversation for tackling racism in Cork and Ireland.

The summit highlighted the stories of black, brown, Traveller, and Roma youth as they expressed experiences of racism through creativity, music, spoken word, dance, and theatre. The summit showcased the talent and leadership skills of these young people, who are often marginalised and viewed through a deficit lens.

It was a fine balance between “sharing their hurt” with the support of their mentors, while projecting a message of hope, saying loudly and clearly that they want to be at the forefront of the movement for positive change.

Attended by over 100 people, the event heard from Cork City Council, Cork Migrant Centre, Cork’s Mexican Community, the HSE, Nano Nagle Place, National Youth Council, Cork’s Roma Community, TUSLA, Traveller Visibility Group, UCC, YMCA, among many others.

The wide range of collaborating organisations demonstrated the need for a concerted, collaborative, system-wide effort and commitment to generate the necessary momentum to make Cork an anti-racist county.

Speaking at the event, Lord Mayor of Cork Deirdre Forde said: “I want to formally acknowledge the various ethnic and cultural groups that make up our diverse community here in the city. Our city is home to Irish Travellers, the Roma community and the black and brown Irish community, who add so much to the city’s culture.

“Later today, I will launch the Cork City of Welcomes campaign, involving all agencies to send a clear message that everyone is welcome here in our city of Cork, regardless of race, age, gender, or religion. Today we all come together to say that racism has no place in our city, in our country or indeed in our world.”

Senator Eileen Flynn shared her story with guests at Cork’s first anti-racism summit and spoke about how she overcame prejudices as a Traveller woman to become Ireland’s first Traveller in the Seanad.

“I wanted to be something that my family could be proud of. My eldest sister used to say, you’re never going to be anything other than a Traveller and I have always thought differently to that.”

Ms Flynn continued: “I remember sitting on the board of directors and the conversation that was being had about members of the Travelling community, antisocial behaviour, and how do we fix young Travellers. Young Travellers don’t have to be fixed, young black people don’t need to be fixed, young people from different ethnic minority groups don’t need to be fixed. We are all different, but we all have equal worth and value in this world.”

The summit is a follow-on from a webinar led out by CMC Youth Initiative Against Racism in collaboration with CYPSC in 2020.

The webinar was set in the wake of the Black Lives Matter Movement, and the murder of George Floyd, which bought the realities of racism and discrimination around the world, and in Ireland, to the forefront.