A travel influencer known online as Zoe has received financial compensation from the Government of Trinidad and Tobago after filing a complaint of racial discrimination, specifically, that black people in Trinidad celebrated a black American streamer more enthusiastically than they have ever celebrated her.
Zoe, who documents her visits to what she describes as "The Colonies," says the trauma began when IShowSpeed arrived in Trinidad to scenes of mass excitement. Crowds flooded the streets. The reception was loud, personal, and nothing like anything she had experienced in her own visits to the island.
“As a white woman I am used to people showering me with attention and free things every time I visit,” she reportedly said online. “When Speed, a black man, received an overwhelming welcome from black people, I just couldn't believe it. Nobody welcomes me or any white internet personality, in that manner. That is discrimination.”
She is calling it reverse racism. She is also calling it resolved TTD $47,000 in damages, paid in full.
“If he was white, the commentary would be so different,” she said. “People would be saying why do we care about his opinion?Like we don't need his opinion about our culture. and if anyone was looking like giving him something or trying to go after him to get a selfie or something, I feel like they'd be told, oh, you're stuck in this mentality of worshiping white people.”
The complaint rests on a logic that has become familiar in certain corners of the internet: that a white person not receiving preferential treatment is itself a form of prejudice. That black people choosing to celebrate one of their own, loudly and on their own terms, constitutes an injury to those who expected to be celebrated instead.
IShowSpeed's visit to Trinidad was one of several stops across the Caribbean and Latin America that drew enormous crowds. The reception he received in each country was driven by genuine enthusiasm from communities that recognised something in him, a connection that had nothing to do with excluding anyone else.
Zoe's government has not commented publicly on the payout.
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