Of doom, gloom and murders

Last Thursday morning, there it was, just like yesterday and the weeks before – violent rage, robberies and over 400 unstoppable murders, all flourishing alongside white-collar crimes, weakened public safety institutions, the US crime advisory and everyone, generously-salaried and luxuriously-perked, loudly excusing himself or herself from any responsibility.

The political bet is on the society’s therapeutic “ten-day wonder” syndrome, especially with Carnival coming. All this reminds me of the late Dr Selwyn Ryan’s newspaper column in 1978 headlined: A Nation of Sheep.

What a society! Reading the saddening news that morning jolted me away from writing about the country’s need for research, innovation and “the achievement motive.”

Among the “doom and gloom” news were: “Taxi driver killed,” “Man stabbed over parking dispute,” “Home invasion again,” mother pleads for “justice” after son’s murder, millions uselessly spent on legal fees and editorials, like columnists, screaming for “political accountability and integrity.”

I tell you, when the children or grandchildren of today’s politicians read the accurate political history of this country, there will be little or nothing for them to feel proud about. That is, if these children remain in the country. That’s how bad it’s getting – with the tormenting hope for better days.

Those of us who still have good feelings, even faith, in this country, experience a tormenting dilemma.

How can you continue to love a country filled with so much published political incompetence, political spite and victimisation? Political “bad mind” feeds social injustice, I can tell you. The courts, whatever their challenges, have a special “rescue and protect” role to play for citizens. The burdens are too heavy for citizens to bear alone. Government agencies have expensively abused the letter of the Constitution to strangle its spirit. Politicians have taken self-serving advantage of the large discretionary spaces left by our democratic structures.

So, like the legal profession itself, how and why would a government reform an inefficient system which serves their own survival?

Excessive political patronage severely violates the hallowed democratic principle of merit and equality of opportunity. With each side inevitably “waiting its turn,” this small, multicultural society will therefore forever remain inefficiently divided: just looking up at the glass ceiling.

And in this, we hear PM Dr Keith Rowley advising the society about “ethical conduct.” Good point, but….

Crime and public safety did not have to become so frightening. Like health and sickness, crime moves from bad to worse if required care is not taken in time. Government and policing have not taken early care to protect and oversee our coastal and inland borders. Fluid immigration and crime are now twin brothers.

The authorities refused to take early care to prevent increasing school violence and delinquency.

The authorities allowed the tail to wag the dog by ignoring need for effective, citizen-supported community policing. So murders, like sickness, have grown.

Today’s countless potholes were once small and much fewer, but were left alone to become deeper and dangerous. The smart-man excuse now is “money had to be spent on covid.”

So today, with water more than flour, everybody else is blamed except those collecting taxpayers’ money.

For such worrying reasons, many citizens are turning to their church, obeah and living selfish lives since they feel those in authority care more for themselves than for them.

The government’s task now is to help change that demoralised disposition. It should help create the social and psychological capital desperately needed for the country’s socio-economic development: meaning trust in government, co-operation among citizens on one hand and a revival of a doctrine of necessity – working honestly for a living, with lessened dependence on government’s widening “handouts.”

Will our party politics allow such a cultural change?

Our citizens should not be led to favour the words of philosopher/novelist Ayn Rand: “When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing – when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favours – When you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you – When you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice – You may know that your society is doomed.”