The Reality of the World we LIVE in

I often wonder why Africa was considered one the wealthiest places on earth and the people who lived their were the poorest people on the planet. Texaco and Shell made billions of dollars yearly yet the people who lived in vicinity of these oil reserves are some of the poorest people on mother earth.

I conceded that it has a lot to do with the powers that may be. The people who live in the area could not effect the political process involved with changing the statusquo of the area because they were not at the helm, they did not have the reins.


Someone I grew up with recently suggested that people who scammed should go and plant fields as a form of employment. I realise that she was probably right. Agriculture has always been reserved for the not so very bright and those without a future. It maybe the reason why parents deterred their children from becoming farmers because of its association with poverty and slavery. Now i live to hear a liberal Arts major telling me that my people should all go back to farming.

It is easier said than done. When these young men plant products, who will buy it from them. It could work, we need to eat more of our own products as imports and the sliding US dollar is killing our economy. But would the powers that maybe: be interested in buying from the young farmers.

Would our government be interested in investing 50 million dollars in creating processing plants for the excess fruits from fruit trees instead of renovating the homes of wealthy politicians?

Would our manufacturers and importers be interested in having a legislative ban on imports and force our people to utilised local produce?

I wonder how many of our intellectuals and Wealthy people would give us farmers a part of their incomes as an investment in such a proposed worthwhile venture.

Who stands more to loose if a project like this ever takes effect?


My friends who know better think I fight for people who do not care about me as a person.
They may have a valid point. My community and poor people does not respect me or even value my opinion because the lifestyle that I encourage is not one that they think will give them the instant gratification that they need.

Many people think that I should just leave Ghetto people to their own wits and ends. Move uptown and treat them with condescension. It is a healthy suggestion but there are many young people, stalwarts in their academical area who are afraid to come back and live in their natal communities. To give back to the community that nurtured them because they are afraid of jeopardising their lives. I want to make Jamaica a place where our university students have no issue coming back to their parental communities and working to uplift instead of migrating elsewhere.



My father was not the best parent emotionally or psychologically. My mother had her issues but as an adult when I hear them talking I realise that something happened during their formative years that made them into the adults they were. I am force to see them as the children they were and not the adults they are today. I know that''s how mothers of young men who commit crimes see their children. They do not see them as a murderer, they see them as the babies they once held.



Some people will not understand our plight. It is not for them to be able to sympathise with those that they consider beneath them. We do not justify criminality. We embrace and emphasise humanity. The human being who makes mistakes, who tries as best as possible to survive his conditions. I clamour for those who cannot speak for themselves, who know what they want but are unable to voice it.

I know that this task is not an easy one. Most Revolutionist are dead. I also know that the people I often defend do not value their lives the way I do. They do not even care. Someone once said to me that if I believe that any one of these young people would have been so intensely passionate about my demise as I am about theirs?

Would they even care if I die tomorrow? They probably don't because I see talentless people waste thousands of dollars while budding entrepreneurs with great ideas have to struggle to bring their goals to fruition. Many Inventors died penniless and people who did not care about the advancement of our living conditions get recognised for creating genocides.

I will continue to say it. We do not need more professionals. We need teachers, healers, lover, philanthropist and Humanitarians. We need people to teach our societies to care more and love more. Despite what you think you have, it is only your human interactions that count. The time you spent with your friends and family is what will evidently count when you die.

I would have exchanged all the money in the world a loved one has if I could get back his life because in my opinion, it was not worth it. I would rather have my family here than have his possessions to look at. They mean nothing without him around.

Why Jamaican's diss the police but respect the Gun Man: Under the Mango Tree Philosophies

THERE ARE SO MANY LESSONS THAT I HAVE LEARNT SINCE I WAS A CHILD FROM THE VERANDAH DISCUSSIONS TO THE UNDER MANGO TREE EXPLOSIVE ARGUMENTS.

These trees have stories to tell...here is one more...


We were sitting underneath the mango tree discussing the recent upheavals within our community when a very intellectual member of our community made a stalwart remark. He said " Ghetto people nuh easy eenuh because danna dead, and people are afraid to talk yet if a did police murder danna, then we woulda have big demonstrations, vandalism of public property and riot" Yet when people within our own communities murder our neighbours we are afraid to publicly denounced what is happening with illegal firearm".


He posed his question to me...

It is something that had troubled me since I was a child and moreso recently and it is a question of why most Jamaicans will publicly crucify the police when innocent people are murdered but turn a blind eye when citizens kill civilians.

I remarked that it has a lot to do with accountability and the culture of hatred that has been recycled over generations for the police force. This abhorrence of the police force stems from slavery when the militia was often called upon to repress the slaves, suppress uprisings and revolts. We have a socio-anthropological detestation of the police force that is inherently cultural and socially programmed.
It is reinforced during the years of colonialism when we fought for our independence and many died by the hands of the police in civil unrest. Our garrison communities are often plagued by extra judicial killings and police brutality therefore children are socialised to respect the Gun man as a protector and justice executor and to loathe the police man as a corrupt, distrustful and abusive representation of the system of oppression.

The police enforces the ideologies and policies of the state which is often spearheaded by members of the ruling or upper class in society. Police officers are regarded as traitors, they have betrayed their community to work for the oppressive system.


There are many rumoured instances within society where "informers are killed because they gave information to the police. This has compounded the distrust that citizens often feel for the police who for many lower socio-economical individuals have failed to protect the majority of its people. Gun men often fire shots to ward off intruders from other areas signalling that the district is protected, offering the citizens a sense of security that the police officers have failed to engender over the years. Popular notion is that if you are friend with police officers, you are labelled an informer and informers within the Jamaican society are assured a swift demise.

Why are Bad Men reverred?

Every body wants to be a badman but no man wants to be a police officer. Bad man culture is revered and the bad man respected by members of the community mostly out of fear than anything else. It is only natural that we will develop a fixation and admiration for the man who deals in what we fear most..death. Not that we do not respect police men, we very much tremble in the presence of the "bad man"police officers that acts more like a rogue cop. The bad men fear the rogue cop because they know the rogue police man will if necessary break the law in his carrying out of justice.

He exudes a level of fearlessness akin to the that of the Bad man. It is this level of unaccountability that makes the bad man feared and the police man disregarded. Ordinary citizens do not fear the bad man police because they know that he serves the purpose of being as ruthless as the neighbourhood gun man. And the average civilians understands that the Gun Man only fears the "bad man' police.


When last has someone been convicted of murder in Jamaica? Most Bad Men roam free until they "rake up the wrong ants nest" and are killed by their own people or the police. All bad men have a bad end. The police is accountable to the states, the government, the judiciary and legislative institutions and most of all to the people that they swore to defend, serve and protect. The gun man has no loyalty to anyone. He fears no one and is not answerable to any governing body. He is loyal to his gun as his bread maker, security and emblem of power. A community knows this albeit not in so many words but this is the central reason why people within an area will know of a crime and are afraid to talk about it because unlike the police the Bad man rarely takes prisoners.

Cable TV has without a doubt contributed to the fascination that we have with men who perpetuate and flirt with death. We are enthralled by how someone could bring about what most of us cannot even envision ourselves thinking. Some people say that young men become assassins because of needs and wants. Killing someone is just a job to them. It gives them an increase level of confidence,control and leverage to know that people fear their ability to take a fellow man's life. The more savagery that they exhibit with their murderers, the higher the respect that they get up the bar.

What turns an innocent baby boy into Murder?

Some experts claim that Childhood Abuse, Mental Incapacity and a criminal culture are the central factors that turn little boys into murderers, rapist and psychopaths.

Many experts attest that most killers are mad in the sense of the word and gain thrill from seeing the life expend from another. Some murderers simply do what they are good at, and if killing gives them a sense of social importance in society. People might not like them but no one will ever disrespect them, people will fear them.

The cost does not outweigh the benefits of the being a contract killer because in a country like Jamaica, a contract killer will never get caught. He will most likely be murdered by members of his organised crime culture, or a young aspirant seeking to stamped his name in the crime culture.

"A big attraction of violence is that the criminal likes to feel that he is acting like God; the thrill of possessing God's power to kill someone is a big attraction"

THE CULT OF THE MAN WHO KNOWS DEATH

We feel contempt, anger, and disgust for the maniacal madman who hysterically kills humans out of sadism, perversion, or just lunacy, and we feel equal contempt for the person who kills in anger or by accident. Yet, perversely, our society stands in awe of those who have the ability to kill while coolly in control of themselves.

" why we romanticize bad men and hit men: they are men who control death. No one is the equal of the man who knows death, uses it, and does not flinch. Look at Patton, James Bond, Bugsy Siegel, Vito Corleone…

I often wonder if Gun men do not think about the fragility of their own humanity when they are taking another life. I beg to envision that with each death there comes a certainty that his/hers individual demise is imminent. Everything goes up in Jamaica except the price of life.

Our Brand Jamaica that we take for granted

I cannot fully emphasise how proud I
am of our brand Jamaica. I am always of the opinion that Jamaican is a good country with a lot of good people surrounded by a few idiots who cower the rest of us into fear forcing us to put up with their foolishness.

A Small island like ours has a cultural movement like reggae and dance hall music, our athletes and sportsmen are the most dominant within the Caribbean region and the world. We have won the Ms World title before, We have been spelling bee champion which means that we have brilliant people and beautiful people among us. We are creative people, people of laughter, humour and fun.Why can't we be committed to ensuring the betterment of our society.

I am proud of the people who represent us on the international front despite everything that others might have to say about Jamaicans. People say we are gay bashers, child molesters, we have the most corrupt political system and security forces but in all of that we have good people among us.


We have young people like myself who in face of death will readily stand up for the betterment of my people and society. I will never let brand Jamaica die or let selfish people who only care about themselves and not the communal benefits of our land we love, destroy the dreams of Marcus Garvey or Michael Manley.


Our young people are cut off from our roots. We need to stop watching TV and have the elders tell night time stories like my grandmother did when i was child where we are encourage to mimic Christian principles and core values. We should be committed to building our nation just as how we are moved with passion to eliminate and hurt our brothers and sisters when they offend us.

I say it over and over again that if good people were as militant as wicked people then we would have a better world but good people live in fear. They know too well that humility will be mistaken as weakness and that in today’s world if you are not "chucking badness" people think you are a softers.

We say what does not concern you that you should leave it alone but we know very well that soon enough the same stick that lick the black snake will lace the yellow one too and the same way a man deal with another man, he will hurt you in the same manner too.

Our Education Minister has called on us to teach tolerance in school but they must know that this will never be enough. We need a cultural overhaul. I see mothers telling their sons to curse neighbours simply because the neighbour insist that if they are going to pick mangoes, call and ask permission instead of sending stone missiles over the lady's yard.

I am not mistaken that these mothers create these monsters, who are menaces to society and then they cannot control them. Most if not all of the young men I grew up with are from good homes with good parents. I use many of them as examples of one can be accomplished when boys are exposed to education and proper values reinforced in their homes. I can attest that all the men who were my classmates in high school are successful young men who will never be caught in certain situations.

We see Beenie Man raising our flag high on an international cable station and I am force to dream again like Martin Luther King about our young boys and the future of our country. I would like for Beenie Man and others to at least become engaged in our education system, spending time in our communities to build back the unity and love that I believe we need to fight crime, violence and corruption.