exploitation

WHY DOES SCIENCE KEEP FINDING WAYS TO EXPERIMENT ON BLACK BODIES?

| Sheree

Tiago_Fernandez/iStock

Reading Bone Rooms by Samuel J Redman, which starts off documenting the beginning of the frenzy to collect bones in the 1800s, especially Native American bones, as a means of establishing pseudoscientific ‘evidence’ to support the racial hierarchy, I am hit by the continued disregard/ disrespect/ lack of recognition of the humanity of black and brown bodies. History is littered by these practices one example being the transatlantic slave trade.But it would seem that history continues to repeat itself and we as a civilisation have failed to put in place safe guards against these atrocities happening again and again.

Has there no just been Holocaust Remembrance Day and the rally call always that we will not let this happen again, and yet we stand by and allow it to happen again and again within our lifetimes because we, and the establishment, pick and choose who’s life is more valuable and recognised and willing to fight/ stand up for. Usually black and brown bodies are not protected and usually there is no up roar in our blatant and deliberate destruction .

I come here today enraged and saddened as hear about the case of the USA funded , Danish scientists medical study on Guinea-Bissau newborns around the hepatitis B vaccination.

Within the UK, newborns are given the hepatitis B vaccination within 24 hours of birth as it is proven to lower the paediatric contraction of the disease. There is no cure for this disease which is life threatening. But does not pose a threat here or any of the western countries because of this preventative medicine as birth.

In December 2025, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) made the announcement that they were stopping their country’s hepatitis b vaccination programme for newborns as there was worry about the effectiveness and safety of such vaccinations. Bearing in mind that the programme has reduced new infections, with up to 90% effectiveness in preventing perinatal transmission when administered at birth and 98% immunity for infants, resulting in decreased liver cancer and mortality.

Why this change of policy? Robert F Kennedy, and the Trump administration.

Then just two weeks later, there is the announcement that the USA will fund Danish scientists in Guinea-Bissau to carry out the medical study on newborns around the effectiveness of the hepatitis B vaccination.

Over 14,000 babies involved where half would be given the vaccine within 24 hours of birth and the other half had the vaccine withheld until 6 weeks old.

1 in 5 people in Guinea-Bissau are infected with hepatitis B far more than USA, Denmark etc. This country is one of the poorest in the world. Why run tests on a vaccine that they know works in reduced the contamination of the disease. And why if there’s concerns about the vaccination why not carry on this study on American babies or Danish babies?

Guinea-Bissau has not asked for this study to take place. This is ‘medical’ colonialism.

The effectiveness of the vaccine has been proven so why carry out further tests that they know will endanger the lives of newborn babies? Will probably plunge the country into further poverty and disease, suffering and deaths related to hepatitis B.

This is just another example happening now of a foreign ( white) state/ power/ institution acting as if they have a god given right to exploit, extract, experiment on black/ African/ brown bodies? As if our lives do not matter as we are just disposals.

That our only value upon this earth is to further the will/ need/ wants/ lives of white people.

This sickens me. This is a policy, funded by fascists, to deliberately murder African babies. Why? Because they think they can. Because they have done so before. Because we live in a system where whiteness reigns supreme.

History does continue to repeat itself and whiteness finds new ways to justify the same harm. Or is the harm getting worse?

Bedtime reading

| Sheree

I started reading this book, hardback, a few years ago from the university library. It got recalled before I could finish it.

I was reading it after reading about how for decades the remains of two MOVE children had been kept at Penn Museum and later Princeton University illegally.

How they were using these children’s remains ( bones) in an online course for demonstration purposes as if they were nothing. Just fine specimens to illustrate a scientific point and not actually once being human and that their family was still alive and none the wiser. They thought they’d buried their children after they were bombs but piece of them were missing. And this wasn’t a mistake or oversight, the family had been lead to believe that all remains had been released to them to lay their children to rest.

I took an interest in this case along with the fascination of bone collecting/ salvaging/ pillaging to study and use as evidence of race hierarchies.

I even started a creative hybrid piece around it all as a means of trying to understand it as well as shed light in the continued extraction and exploitation of black bodies even beyond death.

I titled it:

Why are

our bones

still studied,

disputed,

displayed

and litigated?

I think I need to return to this piece.

A Creative Sketchbook, Dec 2025

| Sheree
My creative sketchbook
My creative sketchbook rules

I’m not sure how my creative sketchbook differs from my visual journal. Intention maybe.

Perhaps, I think , I’m attempting to develop my art practice within a designated space. A study maybe.

I haven’t really been in the thick of my art making practice since the preparation for my Baltic exhibition back in 2022-3.

This was quickly followed with the writings and (re)drafts of Darkling, my poetry/hybrid collection published in October 2024.

After this 2025 has been a period of extended rest and refusal.

But something has been niggling me. The desire to create with paint again. the desire to play without expectations and outcomes/ products.

I’ve just scratched the itch through scrolling through Pinterest. Adding another abstract or landscape painting to a board that I’ll probably not look at again.

But it satisfied this niggling feeling. Until it didn’t.

It was going back into the classroom. Completing a few days of supply that pushed me over the edge.

The time I gave away for money. The time I’d lost pursuing my own pursuits. And realising that I wasn’t pursuing all the pursuits I wanted to pursue in the time I had/have.

So out came a creative sketchbook, inspired by the 30 days sketchbook challenge created by Cheryl Taves over at Insight Creative.

This is as much as I’m willing to share for now about the challenge, my creative sketchbook, processes and insights.

One of my rules is that it’s just for my eyes only. I want to see how this rule changes my practice. I want to create without fear but with curiosity. I want to give myself all the freedom without worrying about what others will think or say or comment on.

It’s not like I’m hanging on other people’s responses and reactions but I have gotten into a habit of just sharing anything and everything on my blog and I’m curious to see what happens when I keep things to myself.

Just for my eyes, heart, and soul only.

So far I’m enjoying the process of the challenge and I’m reflecting and paying attention to what makes my heart sing, what’s my creative vocabulary, what pushes my energies.

Do doubt whatever I explore within my creative sketchbook will be showing up in everything that I create. In everything who I {BE}. For sure.

The Minimalist Vegan – A Review

| Sheree

The Minimalist Vegan: A simple manifesto on why to live with less stuff and more compassion by Micheal and Maša Ofei does what it says on the cover.

This is not a ‘how to’ book but a ‘why’ book. For me, is serves as a reminder and an inspiration as the world we live in continues to suffers from “The More Virus”: the mentality of always wanting more.

This book doesn’t tell me anything that I haven’t read before, but I’m just grateful that this information is all in one place and up to date.

Micheal and Maša, the creators of the website The Minimalist Vegan, mark out how minimalism and veganism intersect, how these concepts work hand in hand to help us live more mindful and grateful and compassionate lives.

Our economic system is based on constant growth by any means necessary. It thrives on us consuming more. Each day we are bombarded by thousands of messages and adverts which persuade us to buy and consume more. The adverts promise us happiness and satisfaction and connection, playing upon emotional triggers. But once we get this new product home, it fails to provide the promised benefits. The thrill soon wears off and we’re left seeking another fix promising happiness and satisfaction and connection.

This book upholds the less is more doctrine. How if we simplified our lives, became more mindful of what we consume, becoming more aware of how every decision we make impacts our lives as well as everything and everyone around us, then we will stand a better chance of saving our lives and the life of this planet.

I found this book a quick and easy read but still important in terms of the messages it advocates. It serves as a reminder that change isn’t easy especially if we’d rather do what everyone else is doing to fit in rather than stand out and make a stand against the industries and practices which cause animals harm.

Did you know that about eight million tons of plastic are dumped into our oceans every single year? The figures in this book are shocking. What is more shocking is when we know the figures and could do something to change them, to make this a better world for all species, we still
choose to do nothing and continue along this path of self and others’ destruction.

Reading this book does affect me and makes me question what more I can do. What behaviours can I start to change today in order to buy and waste less and be more compassionate? Anyone who reads this book and isn’t compelled to make change really is missing the point.