Ronald Thwaites | Straight thinking

When $700 billion has not been satisfactorily accounted for: when there is an unacknowledged spike of maternal and neo-natal deaths which are only disclosed after Opposition questioning: when there are admitted inadequacies causing death, also hitherto undisclosed, contributed to by lack of access to life-saving equipment: when there are massive and continuing overruns on major infrastructure projects with haughty, dismissive rather than plausible explanations, it all adds up to bad governance.

So how come it becomes irresponsible to question the suitability of those in control, no matter how creditable their character is known to be or their performance otherwise? Are public servants immune from criticism? If they are, who is accountable to the public who suffer and pay? Who is thinking straight in the public interest?

UNBRIDLED SOCIAL MEDIA

If the prime minister insists that his operatives have tracked down the origin of a particular piece of slimy social media content and identified a political source, why not just expose the culprit instead of proposing regulations which, without more, will curtail freedom of speech? Same time as the minister of information assaults our credulity by asserting that what the Boss said was not what he meant. Come on!

If Messers Holness and Vaz are to be believed, privacy in Jamaica is truly dead and beyond resurrection. The officials of the State will come after those who they decide have offended them. Holness has said he has the capacity and Vaz, very boasily, has said they have the intent. Now that’s straight talk- dangerous too!

Their statements have huge consequences for everyone’s life and indeed the future of the country, given the social poison and political bile that can be transmitted by social media. We do have a huge problem with fake news and soul-destroying content. The Prime Minister is correct to be concerned about that. The crucial right of free speech is being distorted into a weapon of libertinism which knows no limits and will juk everyone.

JOINT ACTION?

If ever there was a problem requiring joint action it is the anonymous mangling of character and values on those platforms which have now become the major sources of news and views. The only antibiotic to this plague is not primarily censorship but a counter-thrust of strong moral principles and examples consistently counter-poised on the same platforms.

Such a thrust will require intentional value education. How to choreograph and execute that should be of the first order of national business. Which institution in Jamaica, acting on its own, has the moral credibility to lead such a campaign? It requires the type of joint purpose sustained across religious, class, civic and political lines. We haven’t even started to craft that coalition although the infection is raging.

STATE-SPONSORED POISON

What values? We have to start by deciding the moral tenets we want to promote as a people. Right now we’re waffling. Take the promotion of sexual choice on Yute Chatz, a site intended for vulnerable young people which would teach them to see sexual identity as a matter of personal decision. The same people are attempting through the Health Ministry what they were prevented from achieving through the Education Ministry in 2014.

Remember all this is sponsored by a government agency, promoted by international donors, on collision course with widely-accepted morals. It had to be embarrassedly withdrawn last week but only after strident protest. Which minister could have been so tone deaf and amoral as to authorize the release of that material? The authority had to come from Cabinet level.

Who wants to take our children in the direction of gender fluidity or are such persons beyond identification and criticism too? What is the mindset of those who wield such power? With all allowance for tolerance of diversity, what is the standard of sexual morality and family life which we wish to promote in this country? Is it to be and do whatever you feel like? That is not freedom. It is the enslavement of others and society on the altar of individual preference.

FAMILY LIFE

In a recent editorial The Gleaner correctly emphasised the benefits of paternity as well as maternity leave. Sadly, the deeper question of the texture of relationships which best lead to stable unions and good up-bringing for children, have not been considered. Party culture and pretty-pretty life does not usually lead to family faithfulness and stability.

Serious ethical discussion around the principle of the common good is necessary to ground constitutional change, before budget formation and certainly before gratuitous bad advice of a most confusing and damaging sort is forced upon our children. There should be a permanent rejecting of the Yute Chatz content and its replacement with wholesome Christian and humanistic living instruction.

SHAME-MI-LADY

Every week, we end up with a shame-mi-lady list. Isn’t it clear that the Government through NEPA has sold out to bauxite mining and processing interests who routinely nasty up the Rio Cobre, savage the lives and livelihoods of riperian and woodland communities and get away with it. Once again, we learn who our leaders really defend.

Then amidst the good news of a new garbage collection fleet, there is talk of privatising waste collection. I plead that the Municipal Corporations be given primary responsibility for waste management – not the fren-fren, mek-up guys who are exacting tribute, called “contracts”. Councillors are closer than any other elected official to every street corner. They know where the garbage deh and who are the polluters. Invoking the spirit of subsidiarity , most honourable, rescue the councillors from near irrelevance by giving them charge, under NSWMA supervision, of this difficult but crucial civic task. Shame for assuming that private contractors would necessarily do a better job.

Lastly, can’t you hear the spiritual voices of Dr Mary Seivwright, Matron Edith Allwood-Anderson as well as the likes of Mr Powell, Mr Hawthorne and Mrs Dalton James, crying shame that three generations after their struggles for self-sufficiency in education and health, we should have to be importing numbers of teachers and nurses from all over the world because we decline to give appropriate priority to train and retain our own professionals.

Straight thinking could tek shame outa wi yeye.

Rev Ronald G. Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. He is former member of parliament for Kingston Central and was the minister of education. He is the principal of St Michael’s College at The UWI. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.