Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Too expensive to Have Kids and Work

I don’t have any kids yet but when I do, living in the UK it seems I’ll have to choose between paying to have a job and staying home. There’s no such thing as a helper here and if you work you have to either send your kids to a day care centre or a child minder. According to today’s Guardian http://education.guardian.co.uk/earlyyears/story/0,,2001745,00.html , this can cost up to £152 per week for a child under two.

That’s £608 per month. Unless you earn a very decent salary this can make quite a dent in your earnings and remember that’s for one child. If you have two you’re most definitely screwed and will have to stay home. The modern world does not make it easy to have kids. More and more women are choosing not to have any because it is so incompatible with having a career. And we’re not talking rabid career women here, we’re talking about being able to do something stimulating apart from parenting – for some women this is necessary as is earning a salary. The funny thing is the papers here often talk about the difficulties having so few children will cause in the long term – not enough young people to contribute to the public purse over the next generation so that when we are all pensioners – there won’t be any money. Yet they don’t make it easier for people to have kids and earn a living? Doesn’t’ make any sense.

Porn, Blu-ray and HD DVD
Who do you think will win the Blu-ray vs HD DVD fight? My money is on the cheaper version – HD DVD myself. Apparently though, according to the online paper The First Post http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/index.php?menuID=2&subID=1383 who will win will be decided by the porn industry! This article claims that the porn industry decided the fight between VHS and Betamax in the 80s. Take a look at the story – quite interesting.

Monday, January 29, 2007

Polar Opposites Not Helpful

There was an interesting article on the BBC website today about class issues in the UK. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6303181.stm

I think I’ve mentioned earlier that there is a lot of backlash against people who speak correct English have aspirations and have money – they are taunted for being posh. It’s as if to have any credibility in the UK you have to aspire to little and be a member of the underclass. This all seems to be a backlash from a time years ago when there was a palpable discrimination against the working class.

When will mankind learn that jumping from one extreme to the polar opposite does nothing but maintain the status quo?

Saturday, January 27, 2007

Proposals for Positive Change in the UK

The government has decreed that all areas of the curriculum include diversity issues in order to combat myopia and racism and promote ‘Britishness.’ The proposals are a knee jerk reaction to recent times where various British people have announced their racism to the world. In short the government is embarrassed and seem to think measures like this will solve the problem. It won’t.

The curriculum is already crowded. And kids have enough tests, so much so that the emphasis is on meeting targets and not educating kids. Therein lays the great problem. Kids and by extension adults in the UK are no longer educated very well. This in conjunction with what has morphed into a ‘lowest common denominator’ culture over the years contributes to ignorance which leads to racism. Education and culture needs to be tackled and in a particular way.

Also the foolishness that there is a positive common British culture or Britishness must be dispensed with. The papers always say that the hallmarks of ‘Britishness’ are tolerance and fair play etc. This is laughable and recent events on those two channel 4 programmes have shown that to the world.

I have searched myself and I find it hard to come up with positive attributes that sum up Britishness today. I’m not being anti-British but being honest. I may be wrong and if anyone can tell me some true positive British attributes please do. One thing is that yes, it is true that many British people are ‘tolerant’ but this just means they aren’t racist and accept people for who they are. Sorry but you are supposed to be this way, it’s not an attribute for which a group of people should be given special marks for is it? The negatives are really bad though and more importantly, harmful to the British people. They are things such as:

1) An unhealthy attitude towards alcohol
2) Unwillingness to discipline young people
3) Disrespect for older and elderly people
4) ‘Worship’ of sameness and distrust of individuality – everyone must be the same, anyone different is inferior and to be taunted. Unwillingness to stick out. (In order to win you have to by definition stick out.)
5) Lack of interest in current affairs and an unhealthy obsession with ‘celebrities’ i.e. 10th rate individuals who have become notorious, usually for doing nothing relating to talent.
6) Inability to make well thought out decisions and stick with them even if unpopular.
7) Xenophobia
8) General ignorance and un-inquiring minds.

Here’s my suggestions for positive change.

1) Cut out the whole heap of testing and let schools educate kids. Give educators and parents the authority to educate and discipline kids without fear of prosecution. Grow some damn common sense – anyone with a brain can tell the difference between discipline and abuse. Stop the foolishness!

2) Engender a culture whereby being smart is not looked down upon. His Royal Highness used to teach and was telling me one of his students encouraged a classmate to ‘just fail something and then they’ll leave you alone.’ This pretty much sums it up. In many cases here, being smart is seen as a negative. It’s time we British understood that many of our cultural attitudes and practices are counter productive to a progressive society. This attitude is one of them.

3) Amongst the adults, the idiotic attitude that speaking well, doing well and demanding the best of others is somehow anti-British must stop. Stop embracing losing at every thing, stop putting down the wealthy (unless the wealth is ill gotten) and stop accepting the grossly ignorant and debasing behaviour of many others – especially young people.

4) Drink responsibly. Eat before drinking, know your limits, drink chasers, stop thinking of getting drunk as the aim and start thinking of it as a signal you have over indulged.

5) Once the laws are sorted, discipline your kids. Be firm, make smart decisions and then stick to them like glue. Be immovable in a good way. Don’t let the blighters wear you down! With my parents (as with most Caribbean parents) ‘no’ meant ‘no!’ and you knew there was no hope of changing their minds on certain things. In other areas we were allowed to debate and reason out our case. A friend of mine was encouraged to debate with her father about whether or not she could do certain things. So if she wanted to go to a party for instance she would make sure her report card was good, do her chores etc. ask in good time, make sure her Dad knew where she was going and when she would come back etc. and she would often ‘win’ her case. This all helped encourage rational thought too. Also, enrol your kids in some sort of extra-curricular activity that will expand their minds and help improve social skills. Many Caribbean kids are sent to some music lessons or some sports activity outside of school. This is very beneficial. Many of my friends who were sent to piano lessons were able to parlay this skill into an income earner in later years too.

6) Respect your elders – they have often sacrificed and prepared the way for us. Plus they often have some really interesting stories to tell. And hopefully, you too will live long enough to be old. (This is a good thing).

7) Understand that each one of us are individuals. We are not all the same and this is a good thing. Quit ostracising people just because they are different. It is uncivilised and plain stupid. Ostracise people (if you must) for worthwhile reasons (like being a child molester or something bad) not for being themselves.

8) Take an interest in current affairs – they affect you and your loved ones. What Victoria Beckham wore to a movie premier will not take any cash off your council tax bill, so give it the attention it deserves in relation to rulings on council tax bills i.e. less attention. I’m not saying eschew all frivolous pursuits, but put things in perspective.

9) When a decision needs to be made, gather all relevant information, make an informed decision and make it decisively. Even miscalculating is better than inactivity. Stop waffling over things. If you waffle and don’t make decisions, life will make them for you and you may not like what life decides!

10) Let’s crawl out from our own arses - We are not better than people who come from other countries just because we are British. The world is full of people, most of whom by the way are Asian. I believe the UK is about 0.9% of the world population. Get some perspective and enjoy and learn from other cultures.

11) Enquire about things you encounter. If you know nothing about a particular subject or a particular set of people then shut up about them and stop spreading lies. Instead ‘google’ that subject and learn something. Then next time you open your mouth you will sound intelligent and be able to add something progressive to the discourse. Try omitting the following subjects from your conversations over the next month: drunkenness and alcohol; holidays; pets; DIY; celebrities. Acquire a thirst for knowing more and then go and find out more. If you have a question about the habits of someone of another culture or colour – ask them and don’t impose your own fiction on them and then repeat it to others.

There needs to be a common understanding of what the country wants and where it wants to go. And there needs to be a conscious decision to create the best possible future. With the existing culture and behaviour the country will slip further and further into disgraceful cultural squalor. In order for this to not happen there has to be a conscious decision to change.


**

Big up to mi sistren Dr. Cathy Brown who wowed them at the Air Jamaica Jazz and Blues Festival at Half Moon Shopping Village this week. She’s a really nice girl and very talented – met her when I was in University Singers. From the pic in the Gleaner she’s looking good too – the mixture of medicine and music seems to agree with her!

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Looting in 'Foreign!'

You know how in Jamaica you have this kind of idealised idea of 'foreign' especially England? Like how people are really cultured and well educated and very decorous? Also you get the impression that certain things don't happen in 'foreign' like, potholes in the road, power cuts, evangelists on the bus and looting after a natural disaster or tragedy?

Well mi dears, a boat ran aground off the Devon coast the other day spilling out it's cargo - BMW parts, motor bikes, nappies and a whole heap of other goodies. And people went down there to loot! I was watching it on the news and I couldn't believe it. And they were really brazen with it. You remember Gilbert and how people looted by running into a store, grabbing what they want and then running away? Well these folks were quite calm about it and even consented to being interviewed on TV!

I guess it's OK here? Or these people aren't too smart - I mean they are making it really easy for the cops to get them. Now for those of you who don't know, Devon is on the south coast of the UK. I heard on our local radio station Galaxy that some guys from Yorkshire rented a van and drove down to Devon (about a 6 hour drive) just to get stuff. They managed to get a gear box and a lot of other stuff.

So don't believe everything you hear about foreign parts. They're not as alien as you'd think!

Later.

***

Sorry to hear that Basil Buck has died. I guess he makes three what with Neville Willoughby and Charles Hyatt going. The old guard is dying out. I used to work with his daughter-in-law. My condolences to her and the rest of the family.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Dreamgirls - who is the REAL star?

There’s been a lot of’Dreamgirls’ in the news lately. For those of you who don’t know, this is the film version of the Broadway hit that ran in the 1980s starring Loretta Devine (the fat one on Waiting to Exhale), our own Sheryl Lee Ralph and Jennifer Holliday – the one who sang ‘And I Am Telling You.’

The film stars a young actress I am afraid I don’t know but I do know she is Tony winner – Beyonce Knowles in the Sheryl Lee Ralph role and Jennifer Hudson in the Jennifer Holliday role. This role (her name is Effie) is as far as I can gather the star of the film and Hudson’s performance has been lauded by all and sundry backed up by her winning a Golden Globe for it and being nominated for an Oscar. Yet everywhere I turn all I can hear is Beyonce this and Beyonce that! How ridiculous! You have a film with an Oscar winner in it (Jamie Foxx) and a Golden Globe winner and Oscar nominee (Hudson) and all you can talk about is Beyonce? Also, poor Eddie Murphy )also Oscar nominated) who is also a huge star and he barely gets a mention, not to mention the girl whose name I can’t even remember. (You know this is slackness, I’m going to google it, back in a bit).

Yes, I’m back. And her name is Anika Noni Rose. (Beg pardon Ms. Rose!) Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, why the fascination with Ms. Knowles? I know she’s a big pop star but come on man, it’s a big diss to Jennifer who has obviously done so well according to the public and the critics. The only thing I have read a critic say about Ms. Knowles’ performance was that in comparison to the others it was vapid. Anyway, I’ll reserve judgement until I see it. It won’t be out here in the UK until Feb 2. So until then . . .

(By the way, it has the crappiest website ever. It says to click here and there for further information and all you get is a big arse black page with three girls in silhouette in the centre)

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Serious Gales

The weather here has been terrible over the past week. Torrential downpours and winds up to 70 miles per hour. At the last count over 40 people have died. It's been awful and quite scary.

The other day a manager came into our office (at about 2pm) and said we could all go home if we anticipated difficulties - a lot of trains were cancelled due to flooding. On the news I saw a plane taking off and it was being blown from one side to another. The Managing Director of Birmingham Airport was on the way to work when a tree branch fell through his windscreen - killed him instantly.

We were looking out of the window at work the other day and the light posts and traffic lights were shaking. I tell you I didn't think it could get that bad here.

We've had a pretty mild winter so far - temperatures like 13 degrees but it looks like we free paper bun - forecast says there'll be snow tonight. Joy - NOT. Snow looks lovely on Christmas cards but when you have to go to work in it it's no fun.

Later.

Thursday, January 18, 2007

Racist Attitudes Have Changed for some

I hate Big brother and wouldn’t be caught dead watching it. Even worse ‘Celebrity’ Big Brother where people who think they are celebrities go onto the show to desperately revive their career. However, I am commenting on it because it is in the news here big time.
Among the people in there this time is an Indian Bollywood actress by the name of Shilpa Shetty. Over the past few days she has been abused by some of the housemates and there has been a record number of complaints – 7,600 - from the public as the taunts have been racist in nature. Channel 4 where the programme is aired, has received a further 2,000 e-mails and calls.
According to today’s Times Ms. Shetty has been called a “dog” and contestants have complained about her touching their food. Another contestant declared that Indians were thin because they were always ill as a result of undercooking food. Ms. Shetty’s accent has been mocked and she was asked if she lived in a shack.

These were the same type of stupid things I had to deal with in the late 70s. White people in general did not want to touch any food black people touched – indeed they didn’t want to touch anything we touched for fear of getting fleas they often said. This goes to show that over the years many white people – mostly the painfully ignorant – have maintained the same attitudes of yore.

What is heartening about all this (and yes, there is something heartening about it) is that so many people have complained. Let us assume that not all of them are non-white – this shows a massive change in how people think. Calling to complain is an anonymous activity which one assumes is borne of outrage. I mean it would take something pretty bad to make me bothered enough to call the media watchdog. That so many people have seems to indicate that white British people have progressed leaps and bounds in their journey to civilised behaviour over the past thirty years. I mean when I was a girl, the sentiments expressed by these racists were commonly expressed in everyday life in public – without anyone being bothered by it. That people are now outraged, and seemingly genuinely so, is great news for the humanity of white people. Progress is slow but seems to be sure.

Crazy Advice From a Judge
In similar news in the Times a man who called a police surgeon a “f***ing Paki” was advised yesterday by a judge: “Next time call him a fat bastard and don’t say anything about his colour.”

The judge gave this gem after describing the decision by the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute the man for a racially aggravated offence as “a nonsense”.
The man in question had been taken into custody by police officers who mistook him for a suspect in another case. He’d been in a cell for two hours after which he demanded to see a doctor about his back. Dr Imraan Jhetam was sent but the suspect refused to be seen by him, yelling “I want an English doctor, not a f***ing Paki.”

The judge complained about the case coming to him and said that the doctor should have let the insults “roll off his back”. He also said that his comments were “not intended to make light of racist remarks”. Huh! Is he an idiot? I’ll bet if the doctor had been white and had been abused he wouldn’t have told him to just let it slide. My feeling is that if you are a decent and civilised human being, racial abuse is a no-no all the time. The fact that so often white people say we black and brown folk should just ignore it instead of them taking their fellow white person to task for racially abusing people tells volumes about their own racial attitudes.

If I am in a mixed group of people and a white person racially abuses me, why the hell can’t the other white people cuss off their white brethren and condemn their actions? Why is it that their reaction is to either say nothing, or chastise us for being ‘touchy’ if we take the abuser to task? Racists need to be made to understand their behaviour is not OK. If we just ignore their behaviour and bizarrely leave the onus on the racially abused to ignore the abuse, it will continue from generation to generation. White people need to rise up en masse like they have in the piece above and register that it is not OK. Only then will it begin to be eradicated.

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Remember Living Single?

There was nothing on the TV the other night so I put in a DVD. I am a big one for nostalgia of late – reliving the culture of the time when I was in my early twenties and remembering the god times I had then, so I put in my Season One DVD of Living Single. Remember that show? It was really funny, especially Maxine Shaw, Attorney-at-Law and Kyle insulting each other. And who could forget Regine’s ‘Aw sookie sookie now,’ when she witnessed some good gossip. Watching this got me thinking about black people in TV.

In the UK it is dismal when it comes to black people in the media. There’s no such thing as a black TV show here. They had one a while back called The Crouches on the BBC. It was a comedy about a family in London of Caribbean background. The lady who played Auntie Susu on Desmonds was in it. The first season was terrible, wasn’t funny at all. Apparently they had a white Scottish bredda write for it. The second season they saw sense and got a female Jamaican writer and it was fantastic. Sample line: one character says in regards to a friend who has had a lot of plastic surgery: ‘If she blink her eye her foot will kick up!’ Then they cancelled it! Unbelievable!

The UK is a desert when it comes to successful professional black people proud of being black – that are visible anyway. There seem to be plenty in the States but black professional people in the UK seem to like to stay anonymous and are anxious to ‘fit in.’ Only the butus like a high profile. Fitting in is OK as long as you don’t have to ignore a large part of your culture. And that’s what happens here. Black people here say and believe horrible things about themselves in order to fit in and they don’t appreciate people like me raising serious issues relating to race when they arise. They much prefer to laugh these things off and get on with life. It’s ugly. When white people make racist comments of judgements it is our duty to call them on it. If they are just ignorant, they can be educated; if they are evil then they can be at least publicly identified.

Black people should be able to be black as well as their nationality without compromise and still be able to ‘fit in’ with others and vice versa. It’s a pity – there’s a lot black people can offer the UK.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

Dem ah Bleach!

Have a look at this story from the Daily Mail today. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=428541&in_page_id=1879 Bleaching creams are alive and well in the UK and they have been in the news recently. Shopkeepers have been raided for selling these dangerous creams. (The shopkeepers seem to be Asian or African who smartly don’t use their wares buy chose to profit from others’ misery).

This story speaks about the cultural pressure to be white. Having grown up in the UK and having lived in Jamaica for 19 years I know something of this pressure from both white and black people. When I was small in the UK there was severe racism (this was the 70s). I was taunted daily, beat up quite regularly and ostracised. I remember my circle of friends at school were a Moroccan girl, a Pakistani girl, a girl who’s father was in jail and a red headed boy. No-one would talk to any of us because we were outcasts because of the way we look – except the one with the father in jail. Don’t even ask about the red headed thing either – I haven’t got a sensible answer out of white people when I ask them why they ostracise red headed people and trust me, I’ve asked.

Then of course there’s the hair issue. Black people are distinctive in that we are the only folks with hair this texture. As a little girl I do remember putting a cardigan on my hair, flashing it and desperately wishing my hair flowed lightly and freely down my back. I also remember religiously scrubbing my elbows and knees to ‘get the black off.’

In Jamaica I was reborn as a black woman. I thank God my parents took me there to live, every day I thank God! (Thank you God again!) I was in a setting where being light skinned meant a lot to some people but on the whole, being black was intrinsically attractive. But there were what I called ‘the Cherry Gardens set,’ who worshipped at the feet of all things white. Now I went to Immaculate – nuff said. But I wasn’t an ‘Immaculate girl’ if you know what I mean. My mother was, and is a secretary and my father was a welder and we weren’t rich plus I took the bus. Most of my classmates were rich and would never be caught dead on a bus. These girls believed that lighter skinned with flowing locks was superior. Some of these bitches who were black but light skinned would throw a fit if you accused them of relaxing their hair which I did often. Growing up in upper St. Andrew I don’t claim to have an understanding of the reasoning behind poorer Jamaican women bleaching – but I have an idea of the pressure.

As a black woman who wears her hair naturally (dreadlocks) I got a lot of shtick from my peers when I decided to stop relaxing it – in Jamaica. Unbelievable! Isn’t it time this all stopped? Isn’t it time we came to grips with how we look naturally and celebrate it? Funny thing is most men I’ve been in relationships with (including my husband) love the natural look, in fact they prefer it. So why are we women so anxious to falsify ourselves, often at great risk to our health, to make other women happy?

Friday, January 12, 2007

Overpaid Doctors and Giant Rabbits


Today we are told in various papers that there are plans afoot to raise the school leaving age from 16 to 18.

On the face of this, it is a great idea. There are too many uneducated, unskilled and therefore unemployable young people in the UK. However, unless this measure goes hand in hand with making the education sector one which is allowed to hold young people accountable for their behaviour not much will change. If accountability is not allowed they will still be able to disrupt lessons, disrespect their teachers and not do homework with impunity and hence still come out as unemployable idiots- albeit at 18 instead of 16.

I wish them well with their measures.


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Saw a story in the Times today about a German man who raises giant rabbits. This is just the second time in the past week I have come across these animals, they are huge and quite creepy. Have a look at the photo!
*
Read this wildly funny story in the Gleaner today about this church in Trinidad. Apparently this man was living next to a church and the noise they were making disturbed him so much he went round to complain The preacher and congregation then ‘rebuked him in the name of the Lord’ and called him the devil. At some point he threw a stone at the preacher - in frustration? Anyway, the story was really funny. When I first saw the headline I thought, no bredrin, you can’t stone a preacher at the pulpit. But after I read it I could understand. I am a devout Christian but that doesn’t mean that noise made by us must be tolerated. If a church is in a residential area they should take steps to make sure they don’t disturb the neighbours. Hope it gets resolved satisfactorily.
*
So the Lyns’ bodies have been positively IDd. I am so sorry for their loved ones. It’s a terrible thing eh, that if someone goes missing in Jamaica it is almost a certainty that they have been killed. It seems the Lyns were robbed. Now I know we don’t have all the facts now, but if they were robbed, Lawd, wa mek the evil tief dem have to kill dem too? Why Jamaican thieves can’t be satisfied with just robbing people/? They almost always seem to have to murder their victims too. It’s disgusting. Staying away still looks like the
safest choice.
*
And in the Guardian today we are told that UK GPs earn an average of £118,000 per year and now only have to work office hours. They have had a 63% raise over the past three years – most people in the UK get about 3% per year if they are lucky. It seems that this state of affairs came about because under a new contract signed with GPs in 2004 doctors are paid a gross sum to run their practices. What is left after running expenses (such as hiring staff and buying equipment) they get to keep as profit. According to the press, they have been making so much more money by spending less on their practices and keeping a whopping amount for their salaries.

The story claims that this huge wage bill is crippling the NHS – services have to be reduced and patient care is suffering as a result. The story also claims that the Health Secretary has threatened to cap their annual raise at 1.5% but the doctors are kicking up a rumpus saying they have to get at least a raise in line with inflation. Now if it is true that doctors are skimping on the practices by cutting back on what they purchase so that they can make a huge salary then Lord have mercy, are you telling me that a family cannot manage on £118,000 per year? Fair enough, if the NHS wasn’t in trouble, then take your increase, though I believe this high salary is greed especially if is at the expense of patient care. But the NHS is in financial trouble so surely taking a freeze for a couple of years is the right thing to do – it’s unlikely any GP or his family will suffer - £118,000 per year is a bloody fortune. The average UK salary is £25,000 per year – and many earn significantly less than this.

If true, this is disgusting. I have no problem with people creating wealth through innovation and taking risk, but grabbing as much money as you can (and insisting on an increase) while something like patient care gets screwed is just wrong.


Thursday, January 11, 2007

Most People Hate Their Boss

Was a story in the Gleaner the other day which spoke to the fact that most bosses are hated by their employees.

From my personal experience it’s not been that I have hated my bosses (well not all of them) but that their primary mission in life seemed to be to make their employees’ lives miserable.

Why is this so?

I think it’s because too many inept people are put into places of power in the workplace, while the competent ones are left in jobs where they actually have to do something.

Think about it, what exactly does your manager do? For the most part, many of my managers have not had to do the same work as me but have had to only ‘manage.’ Now ‘managing’ is such a loose term. If you work in sales for instance and you and your colleagues are busy selling and your manager doesn’t sell anything but just manages you and you co-worker then he/she can’t have much to do each day unless you and you colleagues are complete idiots and need managing.

I think it would be best if managers were (a) extremely competent in their field and (b) still had to operate in their field. That way they wouldn’t have to fill their time with activities that make life miserable for the rank and file, in order to give themselves something to do and to justify their hierarchical superiority.

Saturday, January 06, 2007

A New Way Forward for Iraq

Former Iraqi defence minister Ali Allawi made some recommendations for the way forward for Iraq in Friday’s Independent. One of them matches up with my humble opinion for a peaceful way forwards. In my humble opinion, the only way out of the current mess is for three separate states to be created from Iraq. I was thinking of separate countries but Ali Allawi’s idea of three states in one country held together by a federal base (kind of like the USA) makes better sense I think. The three states would be (1) Kurdish (2) Sunni (3) Shia.

Trying to create a united country out of what has never been one is ridiculous. Iraq as we know it was only created out of the greed and ignorance of the various conquerors it has had for the pas 100 years or so, so surely it makes the best sense to put them in the groups that already exist but fight each other because one group often has control over the others. As long as the federal head is set up correctly and sensitively and as long as the individual states are as autonomous as possible I see this as the only viable option. I hope the powers that be examine Allawi’s proposal and give it serious consideration.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Here We Go Again - Unfortunately

How’s this for some depressing news? Three days into the New Year and thirteen people have been murdered in Jamaica (I don’t know how many more have been killed now that we are on day 4).

For a country that on the face of it is not at ward, what the hell kind of statistics are these?

It’s enough to make you feel there’s no hope whatsoever at all. Incredibly depressing. Incredibly so.

The leaner mentioned that there is prayer for peace going on but you can’t pray in a vacuum. How can a country spend so much time praying for peace but not each and everyday, each individual order their actions, thoughts and words to be geared towards peace? What can you expect God to do when you ask him for peace but then go out and abuse someone or chop them up or whatever? Too much hypocrisy. I unfortunately have no idea how it’s going to get any better. There has to be a national commitment and action to eradicating the type of culture that produces this level of violence and coldness. Also, the police and judiciary have to be committed to contributing to a safer society and duly and accordingly funded! I fear however that all that will happen is even more of those who can leave will, the rich remainder will gate their communities up even more and more and more will die.


God help us all.

Monday, January 01, 2007

Deepest Sympathies

My deepest sympathies to the family of Neville Willoughby, who died as a result of a car accident December 20. I went to school with his daughters and can imagine how they must feel at this time.

My prayers are with you.