Equality Stamps: Spain’s Effort to Support the Anti-Racist Movement Criticised

Correos Espana, Spain’s state-owned postal service released four skin colour stamps called Equality Stamps this week. The stamp comes in four colours ranging from light skin colour to dark colour. The lightest colour stamp costs 1.60 euros and the darkest 0.75 euros. The stamps were released on the anniversary of George Floyd’s death.

The stamps are supposed to reflect the policy of equality and anti-racism and also the presence of unjust practices in real life. The postal service aimed at encouraging diversity and inclusion. The stamps were released during European Diversity Month. They partnered with the SOS Racism Federation and launched it with a 60-second video with El Chojín, an activist and Spanish Hip-hop star.

But the campaign faced huge criticisms from people of Spain who blames the company for not able to understand the true sentiments of the coloured people in Spain in a sensible way. The campaign faced criticisms on various platforms including social media.

Antumi Toasijé, a historian and head of the government’s Council for the Elimination of Racial or Ethnic Discrimination suggested the postal department withdraw the stamps as it enrages the very community it tries to protect.

The campaign has also prompted a split within Spain’s anti-racist activists. While SOS Racism Federation supported the campaign, SOS Racismo Madrid condemned it. They said that the stamps only enhanced Black inferiority. The stamps revealed that racism was too deep in the structures of power and that the act on the part of the postal company only reveals the lack of sensible anti-racist members within it.

Spain’s postal company has always strived to support the true cause of people.  In June 2020 the postal service painted its mailboxes and delivery vans in rainbow colours to announce its support to LGBT cause in association with LGBT Pride Month.