There is an inevitability to the predictability.
In 1989 Red Plastic Bag won the Pic O De Crop final with De Country En Well.
The blogmaster posted a blog on May 03, 2007 titled Our Nation Is Crying.
The rise of violent crime in Barbados is responsible for 20 recorded murders at the time of posting this blog [23 March 2019]. It does not surprise the blogmaster and some members of the BU family, we have been warning about the weeds sprouting on what use to be manicured lawns. In response BU was branded a doomsayer blog.
Barbados Underground has posted prolifically about a dysfunctional court system. We heard from the authorities that both parties involved in Thursday’s ‘high noon’ execution were on bail.
Barbados Underground has posted about implementing an efficient transportation system. Almost four decades later we have seen a sub culture take deep root. The result has been a paralysing sub culture as we are witnessing daily on our highways, byways AND in society at large.
The blogmaster has also written about the need to implement a relevant waste disposal system. Do we know what will happen next?
What we have is a society comfortable in absorbing a way of life from lands across the seas brought closer by how the global village is now constructed. There is the tension between secular and non secular and the vacuum left by a non adherence to traditional values anchored in religious dogma, ease of travel for leisure and study, access to the Internet and television, music are commingling to produce an intoxicating effect on a small open society. It must be said that Barbados is not alone in the fight.
The blogmaster over the years has been a harsh critic of our growing middleclass – satisfied with acquiring paper trophies, the house, car and frequent vacations to Disney – have retreated from a moral obligation to sustain a quality society. There is a good reason education has been allocated significant resources by successive governments. What is the ROI for education since 1966?
There is something wrong about a society consumed with discussing crime on a day OUR elected representatives in Parliament were debating the ‘2019 Budget’ and our leaders of the future were expressing themselves in athletic competition.
It was widely reported that President Duterte of the Philippines condoned the execution of 30 drug dealers by security forces within four days of taking office. He ran a campaign on a promise to execute known criminals and urged his supporters to kill drug traffickers and dump the bodies on the street.
It is evident that organic change is not possible by adopting traditional approaches in Barbados. One of the most depressing aspects to what is occurring today is to listen to our leaders respond with the usual uninspiring words with that deer in headlights look.
If Barbados is to excoriate the crime infection, we must be prepared to amputate the affected parts. Heavy emphasis on targeting the blocks or certain schools will not be enough. Those perpetrating violent crimes are the victims of a dysfunctional system. How is it possible for the Port Authority to have non functioning scanners for lengthy periods? Members of parliament moaning about the problem because it has struck close to home will not be enough. To the politicians and supporters on all sides: we have countries in the regions to observe how crime feeds on a country polarized by partisan politics.
The blogmaster is not championing Duterte approaches to solving our problems which are most extreme for our culture. However, we should be able to agree that ‘shock’ interventions are required to arrest the decline in our society complemented with longer term strategies. The interventions must be swift and sustained from the leaders in the political and social spaces.
- 24 hour courts (encourage retirees to volunteer)
- On the spot fines (impound vehicles on the spot)
- Child Care and other Welfare Services must be empowered to intervene swiftly in troubled households.
- Random stop and searches (request citizens being searched to record the activity to force transparency, suggestion?)
- Legislate car pooling hours between 6AM to 8AM and 4PM to 6PM – minimum loads), legislate taxi rates in the time periods
- Minister of Education Bradshaw, we need to discuss and implement the reforms promised to how we educate our people as a matter of priority.
- add to the suggestions, non linear only!
Of course Barbadians will protest, it is what we do. However if we want real change to occur, different approaches are now required.
There is an inevitability to the predictability.
Violence is a public health issue. You cannot reduce violence by inflicting more violence on communities. We need to learn from the experience of places like Glasgow, which used to be the murder capital of Europe but is now a model for cutting crime.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/glasgow-was-once-the-murder-capital-of-europe-now-its-a-model-for-cutting-crime/2018/10/27/0b167e68-6e02-4795-92f8-adb1020b7434_story.html
Just as when the public health system breaks down you get outbreaks of Cholera, when the social service system breaks down you get outbreaks of violence. It operates like any other contagion. Prayers will do absolutely nothing to help unless the prayers are accompanied by resolute action to fix the social ills.
One of the best violence reduction models is the one pioneered by Cure Violence in Chicago. It is is a public health approach to violence prevention that understands violence as a learned behavior that can be prevented using disease control methods. “The model prevents violence through a three-pronged approach:
1) Interrupt transmission
2) Identify and change the thinking of highest potential transmitters
3) Change group norms”
http://cureviolence.org/the-model/the-model/
@ PLT
Stop it. You are copying. What is the aetiology of this so-called public health problem? This is now what the silly mayor of London is talking about. The fact is he was too young to remember Glasgow as the crime capital of the UK.
In the late 1970s/early 80s David McNee (42 years ago, the mayor was seven years old), the so-called Hammer, was brought down to London from Glasgow as the tough cop who would sort out London. He did not last very long.
Crime is a social construct and its place on the priority list of social problems depends on politics. In the UK crime is not only mixed up with race, it is also a very strong and destructive expression of racism. Only a couple days ago I was reading about the late Lord Denning, the most liberal Master of the Rolls (number two in the court hierarchy in the UK) in modern history, who, despite his purported liberalism, thought black people were not fit to sit on juries.
Stop Googling half-baked ideas from badly written news stories in newspapers. Remember the so-called broken window theory, stop and search, which has returned as a weapon against ‘terrorism’ as Section 60? It was sstop and search that led to the 1981 ‘riots’ throughout the UK which Lord Scarman though ought to be banned. Lord Macpherson, in his report in to the Stephen Lawrence affair, also condemned police/black relations.
There is an urgent need for a debate on crime, but in Barbados we do not have to import dim-witted ideas from Glasgow or London.
Is this yet another “FALSE FLAG ” that is being executed by the “Political Class” : This horrendous public assault of violence, counterposed to sports and materialism (all being fuelled by people’s fasicination with entertainment via the visual media) are all being used to l ” “DRUG” the masses into a stupor/slumber?
How does this create or promote a “SUSTAINABLE SOCIETY”?
WHERE ARE THE DETAILS ON THE BUDGET THAT WAS PUT FORWARD ON WEDNESDAY MARCH 20 ???????
Is nobody questioning why only snippets of the above have been released?
Is the only role of the “PEOPLE” in this “DEMOCRACY” to pay increasingly more burdensome taxes and “RATE INCREASES”?
Bread and circuses” (or bread and games; from Latin: panem et circenses) is a metonymic phrase critiquing superficial appeasement. It is attributed to Juvenal, a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century AD — and is used commonly in cultural, particularly political, contexts.
In a political context, the phrase means to generate public approval, not by excellence in public service or public policy, but by diversion, distraction or by satisfying the most immediate or base requirements of a populace[1] — by offering a palliative: for example food (bread) or entertainment (circuses). In context, the Latin panem et circenses (bread and circuses) identifies the only remaining interest of a Roman populace WHICH NO LONGER CARES FOR ITS HISTORICAL BIRTHRIGHT OR POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT.
With only one opposition representative (who is of the same ruling party) what assurance can the Prime Minister have/give that public opinion is being TRULY REPRESENTED?
At least the AG is on the ball, he is quoted as saying the “wake up call’ should have been sounded a decade ago. When was this man AG again? Somehow the “wake up call” should only have been expressed after his stint as AG, this man isn’t pretending to be a clown he is the real deal.
Band aid solutions would nit wirk
Those have been tried and failed
Build a Wall. Hmmmm
“There is something wrong about a society consumed with discussing crime on a day OUR elected representatives in Parliament were debating the ‘2019 Budget’ and our leaders of the future were expressing themselves in athletic competition.”
Is it now accepted that Bajan cannot walk and chew gum at the same time? Parliament has been debating ‘budgets’ for over 50 years and we still find ourselves “up the proverbial creek without the paddle” . Perhaps, they should focus on other matters as well.
“One of the best violence reduction models is the one pioneered by Cure Violence in Chicago. ”
Sometimes I have a blindness/bias that approaches sheer ignorance. I am aware of it. The statistics tell me that the whatever model they are using in Chicago it is a failed one. My bias is so strong that I will not look at your link.
On the spot fines (impound vehicles on the spot) . ***I will assume that you will add more flesh to #1 and that you are just brainstorming.
Random stop and searches (request citizens being searched to record the activity to force transparency, suggestion?) *****These stop and searches are never random and lead to profiling. I suspect a select few will escape the indignities of stop and search that some would like to see inflicted on others.
Don’t give up your rights without a fight. Let the government find ways to target the criminals and not every citizen. The wish list is indicative of policing failure.
@ Sargeant,
The wake up call for me was in 2005 when I saw drug dealing in the open in 3 neighbourhoods in Barbados.
I have chosen not to name these neighbourhoods because it would not be fair to the good law abiding people who live there.
#2 Random stop and searches (request citizens being searched to record the activity to force transparency, suggestion?)
*****These stop and searches are never random and lead to profiling. I suspect a select few will escape the indignities of stop and search that some would like to see inflicted on others.
Don’t give up your rights without a fight. Let the government find ways to target the criminals and not every citizen.
BARBADOS on record pace, T&T, Venusuala and Jamaica beware your enviable MURDER RATING is under threat from little Barbados. Wily looking forward to seeing how Barbados Political Class is going to massage this statistic into positive political praise.
I have seen Bajans celebrating/welcoming an increase in bus fares and I wonder if we are all mad.
The only persons that should support an increase in fares are the owners, drivers and conductors. A working ‘yardfowl’ that relies on public transportation should not welcome/celebrate anything that would take money out of his pocket or may take food out of the mouth of his children. Be smart.
Of course you should examine a situation and vote on its merit, but you natural instinct should be hold on to your dollars and resist efforts to empty your wallet. Don’t be the proverbial fool who is easily parted from his money.
Will the shooting / murder in Sheraton Mall be enough to trigger the Police to raid the ghettos ?
@Hal Austin
You need to bring something substantial to the discussion not just ad hominem attacks. The World Health Organization acknowledges that violence is a public health issue; so does the the American Academy of Family Physicians and the World Bank.
I am not a subject matter expert in violence, so my first instinct is to do research. If you wish to understand the aetiology it is perfectly simple to research this… I’ll give you a simple head start from the Center for Disease Control https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pdf/history_violence-a.pdf
@Hal Austin
The “dim-witted ideas from Glasgow” were not from Glasgow… which you would have noticed if you read the article. It does not matter where the ideas came from, what matters is that they WORKED. They achieved real results in the complex real world. It is not the only place they have worked either.
Well, well well! A most enlightening set of verbiage! I am forced to take off my rose- oloured spectacles as ordered by the Commissioner and the AG and see that these murders are reprisals etc. etc. etc.
What are we paying them for again? To tell us what we have been telling them?
And quite conveniently the awakening should have occurred a decade ago.
We the people have been crying out for far more than a decade. First the DLP’s Maurice King famously said there were “no gangs in Barbados” when we all knew even the names of the non-existent gangs. Then the BLP rubbished the DLP who ran on arresting “Crime and Violence” under David Thompson. They even had a foolish t.v. ad to make the mock sport stick. “Crime and Violence”. I still remember that ad. Now we should have awakened ten years ago!
Question for you esteemed farts sorry folks who have apparently been living under the rock instead of on the rock.for decades –
.
Wuhun still got this???????
PS. I suspect when you big ups stop your crime it will be far easier to stop the violence.
@PLT
The idea of crime as a public health issue came from the World Health Organisation in 2005 when it declared Glasgow as the ‘murder capital of Europe’. It was a bad idea then and it still is now.
It was that report that led to Glasgow setting up its Violence Reduction Unit (which London has now done, a bit of re-inventing the wheel).
Before that the Tony Blair government talked about tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. ignored the nonsense, and set up a street crime initiative which looked at pupil exclusions, their home lives, police practices, sentencing policy and rehabilitation. Crime fell after 2002 in London.
At the time I was working for the Daily Mail as a crime reporter and that was my bread and butter. I remember it well. I suggest you talk to good criminologists. I can give you contacts if you want.
@Hal
Good criminologists publish their work and I read it. Are you alleging that the Violence Reduction Units were NOT successful?
I would like to quote from a Facebook post by an acquaintance of mine:
“The gang related violence has 2 interlinked factors:
The gangland bosses and thugs have become emboldened by their public association with top politicians. YES I SAID IT.
Economic disenfranchisement. The opportunities for wealth creation, or even modest success simply do not exist for many Bajans from the lower classes. It starts off with poor health care and nutrition, the social stigma and prejudices about where you live, your last name… even as a child. Then you are streamed into inferior schools and told that you will be nothing. Low expectations foster underachievers.
Then you are treated badly in these schools, punished harshly and unreasonably. Expected to compete in an academic setting with persons who get the best social support on the same timetable.
Then you are not supported when you get expelled from school on the slightest pretext. People are taught that might is right because the world unfair. Then we surprised when they feel the need to own a gun.
Our society is routinely discarding over 50% of its citizens. They find a place to belong and a sense of purpose in gang activity. That is their only avenue to moderate amounts of money as well.”
“We CANNOT address the rise in violent crime at the level of ‘policing’. Harsher punishments, brutal floggings, and the death penalty are not solutions. They are evidence that we have failed as a society and are continuing to fail our children. So now we hide from the truth by killing our mistakes. That is unacceptable.
We need to stop failing our children.”
Is this yet another “FALSE FLAG ” that is being executed by the “Political Class” : This horrendous public assault of violence, counterposed to sports and materialism (all being fuelled by people’s fasicination with entertainment via the visual media) are all being used to l ” “DRUG” the masses into a stupor/slumber?
How does this create or promote a “SUSTAINABLE SOCIETY”?
WHERE ARE THE DETAILS ON THE BUDGET THAT WAS PUT FORWARD ON WEDNESDAY MARCH 20 ???????
Is nobody questioning why only snippets of the above have been released?
Is the only role of the “PEOPLE” in this “DEMOCRACY” to pay increasingly more burdensome taxes and “RATE INCREASES”?
Bread and circuses” (or bread and games; from Latin: panem et circenses) is a metonymic phrase critiquing superficial appeasement. It is attributed to Juvenal, a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century AD — and is used commonly in cultural, particularly political, contexts.
In a political context, the phrase means to generate public approval, not by excellence in public service or public policy, but by diversion, distraction or by satisfying the most immediate or base requirements of a populace[1] — by offering a palliative: for example food (bread) or entertainment (circuses). In context, the Latin panem et circenses (bread and circuses) identifies the only remaining interest of a Roman populace WHICH NO LONGER CARES FOR ITS HISTORICAL BIRTHRIGHT OR POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT.
With only one opposition representative (who is of the same ruling party) what assurance can the Prime Minister have/give that public opinion is being TRULY REPRESENTED?
@Hants
Do you mean more raids?
A Gov’t backbencher- a physician- is being very vocal about bringing back the Death penalty and she is even advocating summary execution for those who shoot at Police. We need solutions and I decided to listen once again to the speech on youtube that the PM made at the swearing in of Cabinet and I didn’t hear one word about crime although I previously thought that she had brought it up, this was against the backdrop of the COP making frequent statements that crime was on the decrease and he had the “stats” to back it up.
I don’t want to be alarmist but I keep hearing anecdotes about individuals not travelling on some roads at night, about people being waylaid by criminals who place objects across the road to stop vehicles, people being mugged in their driveways etc. and much of the criminal activity goes unreported because they don’t believe the crime will be solved or the Police have the will to resolve the matter.
Where is my Sweet PIece
I find it strange that all of a sudden, you have an escalation of shootings and murders under watchwoman Mottley and the same AG that was lambasted for smiling and talking pretty shite, is the same AG that did very little then who doing very little now. This sounding very much to me like if the criminals have been given a ticket to wreak havoc on the land for a period so as to drive fear in the hearts of the people and get them all subdued. Piece, is this how Mottley plans to stay in power?
Do we focus on the escalation in recent months or the fact we have some causal factors we need to uproot.
What will be the Outcome of a Socialist State much Describes your Concerns Blog master
What’s Wrong with Socialism?
We’ve read and watched the news of Venezuelan society collapsing under the weight of socialism. But how bad is it really? See this first-hand account from documentary filmmaker Ami Horowitz.
@PLT
Yes. I am saying the VRUs have been a failure that is why they have been largely abandoned. The London mayor is playing politics.
The most up to date criminological work is in think tanks and university departments. Books can take years to write and time moves on that is why the latest work is always in the journals, seminars and post-graduate students’ research.
I repeat, crime is a social construct and social policy is the best way to sort it out. Sometimes the offender is mentally ill. However, it is not a communicable disease; people do not catch crime from sitting on a ZR van next to a robber. The very idea is bogus.
@Hal
“crime is a social construct and social policy is the best way to sort it out.”
++++++++++++++
I agree completely. You have radically misinterpreted my argument.. of course “… people do not catch crime from sitting on a ZR van next to a robber.” I did not mean to imply any such thing. I quoted experiences which argued that it required a public health approach… I thought everyone would understand that the comparison to disease was metaphorical.
I know that the “… latest work is always in the journals…” which is why I googled “which communities have successfully reduced gang violence” and read articles in the Journal of Issues in Nursing from 2014, and Preventive Medicine Reports from 2016.
When I sought to evaluate the effectiveness of Violence Reduction Units by searching research journals the articles I found all substantiated the effectiveness of VRUs. I did not find any that said VRUs have been a failure, but I am very interested in reading such research so I’d be grateful if you would point me towards it.
So since we agree that “social policy is the best way” to sort out the violence problem, let us discuss the specific social policies that might have the best effect.
Hal
spot on. but in Bim we need to look at short terms measures or fixes in better policing methods and court procedures and at the same time long term social ills
@PLT
You have not said that crime is a communicable disease, but that is core to the theory of crime as public health. About the relevant social policies, let us start with the home circumstances, is there a man in the home; look at the schools and the performance of the pupils, then look at the preparation for the world of work. At every stage there must be remedies for those who are falling behind.
We must also look at policing, the courts, sentencing policy, incarceration, prison education and industries, rehabilitation and the probation and welfare services.
@Hal
So which specific social policies that will have the best effect in reducing the violence? What will they cost? How will we finance them?
The Missing Link… Socialism Leads To Violence
Gloria Alvarez reported recently, noting that it wrecks economies. In this video she points out that it also leads to government using force against its own citizens. Regimes that call themselves socialist have killed millions of people. Tens of millions were killed in the USSR. Same in China.
Millions also died in Cambodia and North Korea, which claimed to follow socialist ideals. Alvarez says that socialism, whatever the variant, tends to turn out the same way. Right now, people die in Latin American countries that fell for socialism’s promises. In Cuba, because government restricts private property and trade, Cubans trade on the black market to survive. Sometimes government violently cracks down on them.
Alvarez interviews Ibis Valdes, who says: “my father was a political prisoner [in Cuba] for almost a decade … because in his 20s he sold soaps and perfumes and did not want to relinquish all of his profits to the government.” Michel Ibarra, who escaped Cuba, says: “Socialism is the perfect excuse for someone who wants to rule an authoritarian regime.”
Political violence in the name of socialism also occurred in Nicaragua and Venezuela. Alvarez interviews Ramón Muchacho, a former mayor of a section of Venezuela’s capital city, Caracas. He tells Alvarez that he was pressured by socialist leaders to use his police force to brutally suppress protests against the regime. Because he refused, he was threatened with jail. He fled to America.
“It seems to me we are not able to learn,” Ramón Muchacho tells Alvarez. “[Politicians] will always be dreaming about the future and never delivering. People keep falling in love with that kind of crap.” Alvarez hopes that some will learn. Gustavo Tefel, who fled violence in Nicaragua tells her that he did. “I don’t think [people] realize how deep socialism is involved in all [the violence]…
@PLT
Funding through the public purse and the polices are the ones outlined above.
More poverty equals more crime
keepitupmiaapromiseisacomforttoafool
We are talking about “addressing the problem of crime in Barbados” and convincing arguments have been made for addressing it at the root, but no one is mentioning the elephant in the room. The truth is that we are not really talking about crime in Barbados, because in our country some people can commit crimes with impunity while others receive harsh punishment for doing the same. As long as this blatant system of injustice continues and Bajans openly tell you that prison in Barbados is for Black people, we can put forward all the ideas we want to solve the problem but we will make no headway. By the way, does anybody know if Walter Prescod is out on bail yet, 8 months after he was arrested, all the while Charles Herbert and Chris Rogers walking bout?
@Hal
Are you not being facile? We know that there is no more money in the public purse without raising taxes.
The current Minister of Youth Adrian Forde has recently launched his Building Blocks programme which seeks to teach adults on the blocks ages 18 to 40 to start their own businesses. Is this going in the right direction? Do you think it stands a chance of success?
https://barbadostoday.bb/2019/03/19/forde-blocks-to-become-entrepreneurial-centres/
@PLH
When we have pressing social problems that need resources to solve them and the government was already crying for a lack of funds, why reduce corporation tax to practically nothing?
It is widely understood that drug trafficking criminal gangs are the inevitable outcome of drug prohibition. We have known this as an incontrovertible fact ever since gangsters like Al Capone and Bugsy Siegel were created by alcohol prohibition.
Why do we not simply follow the money and end marijuana prohibition tomorrow?
@Tee White
“… why reduce corporation tax to practically nothing?
+++++++++++
You will have to ask this question of someone that agrees with current government policy, not me.
Find it amazing that after all the long talk about more policing of the targeted areas for known drug hangouts and crime related incidents that the criminals have all but out smarted the police
In as much as taken to what most would term or identify as safe areas
to commit mayhem in the form of murder
This last murder serves as evidence that the criminal element of this country is fearless ..and tackling crime would require more than policing certain areas but acquiring policies that have goals which ate iron clad in keeping fast forward pace ahead of the criminal mind
Can we agree that unconventional intervention is urgently required and that it transcends the usual political exchange offered by many here and elsewhere? Can we agree to this point as a jump off?
@ My Dearest SSS
I am still here
De grandson and I finished up something yesterday and we were busy but it is done
Where to start nuh??
First thing first
https://i.imgur.com/BRPuA9k.png
I am reliably informed by others more knowledgeable than I am that what has happened in as I said earlier
(i).The contraction in discretionary spend caused by the badword dat Stiinkliar and Fumbles do to the country has caused a serious problem with the drug consignments being sold out as contracted
(ii).The introduction of additional big ups into the drug market has caused another dynamic which is IN A CONTRACTED MARKET, the real druglords and not meeting targets and are therefore at risk of being taken out.
(iii).BECAUSE OF THE NAMES OF THE PEOPLE WHO ARE INVOLVED the infighting CANNOT TEK OUT DESE high society big people CONSEQUENTLY at the street level you are having the street & territory wars.
That part is sanctioned BUT THE RETRIBUTION KILLING ARE NOT but the big guys CANNOT CONTROL THAT PART and that is why you seek absolute loss in Teets eyes and Griffith’s face when they are talking about these illings
(iv).The Thing about killing a Druglord or their family is that there cannot be any schedule attributed to the ensuing reprisals
By that de ole man means that IT GOING REALLY GET EFFED UP if that happens because AT DAT LEVEL dem haffa show backbone so it is not really reprisal killings but LAW & ORDER among druglords
You have to be extreme to show that you are not to be messed with.
Now, what will that do my dearest SSS?
When that happens it is going to really affect the tourism market.
Because while a po’ black boy from Crab Hill or Deacons getting kill ent no big ting and will sell a few more papers WHEN DE BIG BOYS’ FAMILY GET TEK OUT dat gine viral!!!
But none of this is to be feared really because this IS WHY MUGABE IS A 5 YEAR GOVERNMENT, they cannot solve the crime because well MUGABE heheheheheheheh
Well let a feller say dat de devil ent going punish imps heheheheheheh
Many of you posting to this blog and in wider society do little to assist people in need of help and by extension country. We see the violence and react by posting on social media and expressing horror at the state of affairs with friends and family. Then we close our windows and doors and pick up the remote to the TV. The current state the society finds itself is a vivid reflection of its citizens.
i understand you do a lot to assist. you should be congratulated for that David
@Greene
The comment was not about the BU household. You travel around Barbados and there is the us and them culture gaining traction, there is the divide opening wider and wide. We have to solve our problems as a collective. What message would it send if the political parties see what has happened as a tipping point to call a truce for 12 months of all the political hogwash banter and hammer out an action plan with NGOs to win back the country? We need to protect whistle-blowers. Let us offer rewards/bounties for information that leads to arrests/conviction. Let us do something that works!!!
@PLT
Sometime ago criminologist Yolande Forde gave an estimated cost for keeping people in prison in Barbados. That is where most of the money will come from; better educated people mean more jobs, increased productivity, higher tax revenue, that is where a large part of the money will come from; reduced crime rates mean a reduction in an ever-expanding criminal justice system, that is where some of the money will come from.
@PLT there is nothing called a free lunch in this town. If we want to control crime we must pay a price. Read Nobel Prize winner Gary Becker on the cost of crime.
@David
“Let us do something that works!!!”
+++++++++++
So perhaps we should start out by discovering what works… are we the only place that has problems with gang violence? No? Then perhaps we should google “which communities have successfully reduced gang violence?” and actually learn from what has been successful elsewhere 😉
@Peter
Believe it or not the blogmaster sides with the view that this is a social disease and if we prescribe the right medicine we can stabilize and possibly cure. Our problem is that we continue to ignore the virulent nature of the disease to the host and it whilst doing so it continues to spread to other areas of the body (society). From where we sit the issue is not the action plan per se, it is the collective will of the society to attend the doctor and identity the right medicines. To use a simplistic analogy.
We need more people working in a coordinated way; interdependently to move a break point.
David, David David.
There is more than one way to skin a cat…
THE FACT IS THAT WHAT PACHAMAMA SAID YESTERDAY ON ANOTHER POST IS ABSOLUTELY TRUE.
He said that ONLY THREE OF THE parliamentarians commenting had anything to say and that the rest could STFU
When one sits and watches this playacting with these inferior superiors one cn continuously come here and post shy$e every single day OR MAKE IT SO!
And by make it so, i mean doing what you always talking about all the time.
Doing it takes time and $$ especially when you self fund a thing.
It is hard but IF YOU ARE A PATRIOT and if one is committed to all the shyte talk that one espouses THEN YOU LEAD BY EXAMPLE especially when you are in the army of a Special Entity
You have to understand that there will always be men and women who have no balls/conviction, that is the docility in the DNA.
What GOD DID WITH THE CORRUPT WAS TO LET THEM WALK IN THE DESERT FOR 40 YEARS, in a circle, till all of them died out.
So too, these concentric circles with the BLP and DLP and these killings MUST PROCEED until that mindset dies out AND A PEOPLE ARISE THAT WANT MORE!!
I genuinely want there to be 50 deaths, not because i delight in that BUY BECAUSE Right now my man, Bajans dont really give a FVUCK!!
Until it becomes a pandemic, and you got to drive bout IN A CARAVAN OF VEHICLES as you traverse barbados, this nonchalence WILL PERSIST cause it is dem RHs from de favellas dat deading
YOU SIGHT???
A man must genuinely want change and not talk it cause it seems like a good thing, then we going seriously sit down and engage to change this morass.
You need to look up Low Crawl and learn how to low crawl when the bullets start around you, you get down lown and crawl on your belly using your hands/elbows and knees in an oaring motion and dodge the bullets
Until then WE WILL REMAIN KEYBOARD WARRIORS or some of us, because others of us are putting their $$ where their mouth is.
With the expansion of a welfare state in less than eight months the rate of poverty will increased as welfare would be unable to meet the social demands
This reality would lead to many seeking alternative solutions to adress their daily livelihoods
Many would see the drug world a source of accessibility and comfort to meeting their daily needs
To say that reality is not happening at present and which might have lead to an upward surge in crime who be burying one head in the sand.
@Hal
Thanks for pointing me toward Gary Becker on the cost of crime. I was familiar with his work on racism, which was quite good even though he was a conservative… in fact it alienated him from other conservatives when he pointed out how much racism costs the whole society, not just minorities.
I will read up on his rational choice theory of criminal behavior.
@ PLT
The current Minister of Youth Adrian Forde has recently launched his Building Blocks programme which seeks to teach adults on the blocks ages 18 to 40 to start their own businesses. Is this going in the right direction? Do you think it stands a chance of success?(Quote)
I thought the cohort was 18-35, but that is minor. I think it is doing the wrong things for the right reasons. A 40 yr old man is not a youth, he is middle aged.
As I said earlier, let us start from the cradle, what is taking place in the family home; then school, is the pupil learning as expected; then post-16 training or education; then a job; then opportunities to save and start a family. We must stop those angry, bitter magistrates from destroying young lives by introducing a tough sentencing policy.
Barbados s too small a nation to waste our youth. Social capital is priceless.
The college boy Adrian Forde is biting off more than he can chew. He is Mottley pet. Should have stuck to Pharmacy
@Hal
I agree that we need to start from the cradle, but I think that we cannot wait for those policies to bear fruit in 16 or 18 years.
My apprehension about Minister Forde’s programme to teach entrepreneurship is that these people will be directed towards the usual low income enterprises like weed whacking people’s bush or selling sweet drinks. Such enterprises are not likely to provide enough to survive on, never mind a decent living… so as Gary Becker points out, the rational choice is to revert to criminal behaviors.
We need instead to train disadvantaged people to gain access to more lucrative ways of making a decent living… why not train them to do something that really has a role in 21st century life?
Why not train them to be computer programmers? Crazy? Not necessarily. We have the TEN Habitat Code Academy; the challenge is that it costs $20k plus each student needs a good laptop. So to train a hundred people on the block we need to raise more than a couple of million dollars. Impossible? I think not.. it wouldn’t be easy, but it’s not impossible.
Maybe that’s what I’ll do…
@ PLT
I want to talk about policy, not hunting for business.
@Hal
Unless policy options are sustainably financed they wither on the vine. I’m anti-capitalist, but realist.
@Hal
Plus I want to actually do isht, not just talk about it.
I really don’t know why you’re all so mad. The fact is that Barbados is now internationally in the media. I bet our government copied that from Trump: Better bad news than no news at all.
You all need a dose of reality: After 10 years of North Korean economic and financial policy under this figure, who can’t even handle his decimals, Barbados is totally ruined. Youth unemployment is high and the population is impoverished and totally demotivated. Drug trafficking is the only way to make a substantial extra profit.
The Prime Minister now has to show her toughness and reintroduce the death penalty as well as the labour penalty. 50 x execution of the death penalty per year would bring us maximum attention in the international media. I would also just like to point out to David that the labour penalty is in line with all international conventions, in particular ILO. If we let all prisoners work, all roads will be repaired in 12 months.
So what changed since the last blog titled “CRIME WAVE” less than a month ago? Did the public execution of a minor criminal spur this response? The Gov’t doesn’t have an answer other than “lock em up and throw away the key” or “prayer”, we will be stuck in a holding pattern for some time.
There is the oft repeated question from the former PM Sandiford of “How did we get here?” as it relates to the economy, we should be asking ourselves the same question about crime.
The only thing that can provide relief is if by some miracle there is some employment opportunities for those on the “block”.
@Sargeant
There is always that damascene moment.
WANTED: NATALIE HAREWOOD. The police in Barbados seem curiously incapable of locating the very popular and, therefore, recognizable Natalie Harewood, of prostitution and political fame, for questioning as it relates to the destruction of property owned by and located at:
…………Sophia Bailey, #14 Oxnards Crescent St. James, Barbados…………
Sources claim that Natalie Harewood is a police informant and a provider of personal ‘services’ to members of the (Royal) Barbados Police Force. Natalie Harewood scoffs at the idea that anyone in the Holetown Police Department would ever dare to pick her up for questioning! Officer (Badge #1484) Forde’s close association with Ms. Harewood needs to be investigated.
We all watched (and as was admitted by Natalie Harewood herself) when Ms. Harewood destroyed one of her customer’s vehicle by bashing in the windows of his truck. No arrest was made on behalf of the queen in that criminal matter. Not to mention her smoking marijuana, which possession of that substance happens to be illegal in the queen’s commonwealth of Barbados, during the taping of her videos. Talk on the streets allege that Natalie Harewood is also using cocaine.
WANTED: Natalie Harewood. Last known address (provided to the RBPF):
Rohan Layne (who lives with his mother Jennifer Layne.)
Grazettes Road (Directions: Fifth house on the right, white wall house, green patio with air conditioning unit, opposite the day nursery. If you are coming from Tudor bridge, it’s the left turn.)
Yet, the police in the tiny island of Barbados can’t seem to take hold of Ms. Harewood, for the pleasure of the queen and all, and the accomplices who aid and abet in her circumvention of the law.
WANTED: Natalie Harewood
Barbados’ dramatic increase in violent crime is directly related to the ” re – hiring ” of Darwin Dottin to the public space.
No less a person than a Governor General of Barbados – some years ago saw the wisdom & incontrovertible evidence to remove Darwin Dottin from the post of Commisioner of Police.
The police are the ones to fight crime !!!!!
Fifteen of the murders in 2019 – occured since Darwin Dottin was returned to ” public life ” by this BLP administration to “””fight crime “”” !!
Barbadians pleaseeeee …….
Stop the ROTTIN !!!!!!
Fire…..Darwin DOTTIN !!!!
That old saying “Follow the money” seems to work. Drugs, firearms and ammunition in the quantities that appear to be prevalent in Barbados cannot be paid for in Barbados dollars.
Let the financial crimes unit along with the BRA do some investigative research into who and what entities have access to large quantities of US dollars but appear to be not reporting same. Start tapping phones (again?) and it shouldn’t take too long to see where the money is coming from and where it is going.
This of course is in tandem with some of the above suggestions to reverse the undesirable societal trends.
David
Why are we so surprised by ‘crime and violence’ in Barbados. When economic violence has been meted out for centuries we did not see such consternation.
The truth is that the world is at a critical juncture and all norms of behaviours are changing, and not for the better. So it should not be surprising that the once thought of Bajan is responding to cosmic forces.
Just this week, the American dictator Trump, supported the idea that the Golan Heights, international recognized as Syrian territory as occupied by the Zionist regime should be now seen as part of the so-called Israel. We fully expect him to seek this coming to legalize the unlawful.
Is that not crimes and violence? Who could bring this criminal to heel? Could this not lead to a war, the final war, where could be omnicide?
For the last 20 week in France the Yellow Vest Movement has been confronting that wicked government. And while their uprising is more morally casted than ordinary crime and violence, these are both forms of unsocial conduct nonetheless.
In the UK, we may have similar violence soon as well, when clear evidence is thusly presented showing that the ‘right to vote’ means not one shiiite.
It is the English norms of conduct that the conservators of decentcy in Barbados, like Sir William Skinner et al, would have us adhere to. But when the English themselves have behaved badly in the past and will so do again soon, we do not hear such scribes holding them to their own standards, as perceived.
We have never recognized the inherited norms of behaviours as handed us by the British as worthy.
The elites in Barbados have been serial law breakers. They have taught the ‘boys on the block’ well how to disrespect said social norms. So much misbehavior was done by them over decades that the nation state itself was brought to its knees, and may well still succumb to life threatening injury. Where has been the corrective for them?
Separately, David
Was trying to find the financial statement as was supposedly one-half of the presentation from Wednesday, and could not. Is it possible not be able to analyze the numbers which the PM spent a quarter of a day talking about?
And if that is so, what are the orders of magnitude of this con?
@Pacha
It was a budget not of the normal delivery. It is difficult to cost or analyse the numbers because for several initiatives none were provided.
https://barbadosunderground.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/stay-the-course-draft-outline-final-excluding-appendix-5-crj.pdf
Suffering from the same problem now as PIECE use to. David
David that was not a budget ..but a hatchet job on the poor people of barbados
I hope the people learnt there lessons
Never drink koolaid during election cycle
If it sounds too go to be true ran as fast as possible meking sure yuh feet hit the ground
#####watchmuhnow
David
Surely, this is a departure from tradition, and will prove to be a big mistake. It could cause continuation problems in the future.
Economy is not immune to ‘estimates’ in the circumstances you so described. Even if those estimates are off, and they often are, we need a baseline, a model, to look back to, to plan for the future with.
Absent such, a year from now the PM could then impose numbers with the benefit of 20/20 vision. That cannot be fair!
Wow, no revenue and expenditure number. Without these the nation’s 6 hours on Wednesday were wasted.
@Pachamama
The IMF targets are all that matter at this juncture.
David BU
PM Mottley right to do what she did during the Budget speech.
No Financial statement outlining the costings for the basket of horse prattle she introduced.
But then again……her behaviour was consistent with that of a DESPOT !
BARBADIANS…..were warned !!!!
Interesting at the polyclinic too
http://www.nationnews.com/nationnews/news/239028/safety-measures-winston-scott-polyclinic
Adriel Braithwaite. FB
I was always saddened when persons like the present AG opposed measures aimed at addressing crime in Barbados. The BLP opposed the amendment to the Police Act which enhanced the powers of the police. Indeed they promised to repeal it if ever in office. They opposed promised anti gang legislation and amendment to the Bail act which would have made it difficult for persons on murder charges or members of gangs to be given bail so easily. Instead some politicians ( I don’t want to be sued) struck alliances with suspected gang leaders on every block that they could find all in the interest of power. This is a very sad time in the history of our nation.
“Wuhun still got this???????
PS. I suspect when you big ups stop your crime it will be far easier to stop the violence.”
pretty much…a few more of them want hauling in…a la Donville.
@Hal Austin ” the Stephen Lawrence affair”
Why do you call Stephen Lawrence’s MURDER, the Stephen Lawrence affair? There is no need to bowlderize the young man’s murder.
We need to name MURDER as exactly what it is, MURDER.
@ Pachamama
I noted that you said “…Wow, no revenue and expenditure number. Without these the nation’s 6 hours on Wednesday were wasted…”
Fractured BLP echoed a similar strain of thought.
Please simplify this procedural matter for an ole ingrunt man like me and the sheeple reading this statement
What does this mean?
Has Mugabe not delivered a Budget without there being numbers?
Me fears that this two liner is lost on many bajans so i’d love you to clarify it please
@Hal Austin “There is an urgent need for a debate on crime.”
We can’t waste time on a debate on crime, even while our young men slaughter each other. We have to stop the murders now. Now is not the time for academic debates. Now is the time to stop the killings.
@TheOGazerts March 23, 2019 9:35 AM “I have seen Bajans celebrating/welcoming an increase in bus fares.”
So where did you see these celebrations?
i am right here on the spot and I have not seen any celebrations.
What i have seen is a dour acceptance.
The same dour acceptance as with the sewage and garbage tax. The government calls them contributions. Everybody else calls them by their right name. TAXES.
@peterlawrencethompson [‘s friend] March 23, 201910:16 AM “It starts off with poor health care.”
NOT TRUE.
Even while I agree with some of what Peter’s friend wrote on Facebook, it is NOT true to say that poor children in Barbados are exposed to poor health care. The public health care delivered to poor families, and to middle class families who choose to access it through the polyclinics is in fact EXCELLENT. First world excellent. In fact better than the care delivered to poor people in some first world countries,
@Peter’s friend on Facebook “expelled from school on the slightest pretext.
It is NOT TRUE either to say that Barbadian children are expelled from school “on the slightest pretext”.
Invariably children who are expelled have typically used violence against or repeated threats of violence against another child, or against a member of the school’s staff.
@Hal Austin March 23, 2019 11:10 AM “About the relevant social policies, let us start with the home circumstances, is there a man in the home.”
And not just any ole man in the home.
But a GOOD MAN in the home.
I trust that you know that there are some fathers and step fathers who introduce their children and step children to drug dealing.
In cases like that the home would be better off without such men.
I would say to any politician who invites any drug dealer to their home or their office. Any politician who socializes with drug dealers, who goes to their weddings or funerals, who stands as godparents to to the children of drug dealers:
if you sow the wind, you WILL reap the whirlwind.
@Piece
No I do not want to see another 30 dead sons.
I would wish all of our sons to live to old age and to die in their beds at home, or in their beds in prison, yes even the drug dealing sons.
If the ideas suggested by Peter and by Hal will work, then they should be implemented immediately.
If we do nothing, then they murder rate will increase, it can become as high as more than 100 per 100,000, but by that time we will have a huge out migration and no tourist industry
When the shootings and murders spike began in May last year we thought it was a blip that would settle down after police arrested the perpetrators. It turns out not to be a spike but a long ongoing spate of the most brutal killings and shootings.
2019 without a doubt is the darkest chapter in Barbados’ history nothing else comes close.
The brazenness of the murders in broad daylight in crowded shopping malls is naked horror. The nation is justifiably very afraid. People are beginning to think twice before leaving home especially at night.
The vast array of guns in the hands of obviously heartless killers is inexplicable there is no end in sight for the gun violence.
Much time is spent by government pointing fingers at the past government as the cause. This is unacceptable the people voted for Motley’s team to solve problems because that is what they were promised.
The reality is we have a country in crisis the likes of which we have never seen. Right thinking citizens want to see the severe crime problem wrestled to the ground.
Words like ‘not bout here ‘and empty mountings from the prime minister and attorney general affords us no comfort their policies thus far have failed miserably.
Twenty murders is the average for any single year in our post slavery history. We equaled that figure by mid march. A solution to the carnage must be found before we officially become a failed state.
I agree with @Mariposa Facebook Post made by Adriel Braithwaithe in regards to the gang leaders and Drug lords feeling empowered because the current Government sold its soul to win election last year at ALL cost.
Combined with deep deep corruption in the Barbados Police Force it has gone past the point of no return regardless of future studies or models proposed.
Corrupt Barbados police officers are involved in “the gangs, money laundering and human trafficking—with young foreign girls fast becoming the preferred targets”.
This has become the ‘new industry’ along with drug trafficking for corrupt police officers to earn a hefty supplemental income albeit by illicit means.
Human trafficking is a variety of corruption that has established what appears to be a permanent presence on Barbados shores.
Barbados police officers are heavily involved in human trafficking with strip club owners and brothels in addition to working with local gang leaders and Drug Lords in trafficking drugs hence leading to increased mayhem.
Police corruption in Barbados, takes four forms—low level/petty corruption such as receiving bribes, abuse of administrative procedures and process such as failure to investigate, corruption borne out of liaisons with criminal groups and high level corruption such as disclosure of police information or evidence to benefit political groups for which the officer is affiliated.
THE ROT ON THE ISLAND OF BARBADOS HAS PENETRATED TOO DEEPLY and is now no different than TT, Guyana or Jamaica.
PLT is making much sense. Personally, I believe that we should have mandatory “military service” for any young person that is not gainfully employed and speedily going nowhere in life. The concept would be to teach Discipline, to Educate according to ability ie Uni if capable, technical training , Trades -carpentry, masonry, painting whatever is required to build a decent income and provide marketable services. Note that countries that have mandatory military service have far more disciplined and successful societies. If we take people off the streets, decriminalise Ganja ie take the profit out as price would collapse, we might be able to turn Bim around.
MoneyaBrain
That is a good idea, but you think the government has the financial resources to housed, feed and clothed all the young people leaving school in Barbados? And in most countries mandatory military service is designed for males and not females …
Many of the contributions on this subject are truly hypocritical. The fact is that selling drugs is the only way to get rich quickly in Barbados at the moment. The island is so run down after 10 years of rule by these plantation dwellers that it will not recover so quickly.
You should ask yourself who pays the lawyers of the drug soldiers who are currently shooting around. The money comes from the drug trade. In other words, many lawyers in Barbados are involved in money laundering and organised crime. Those who knowingly accept drug money as payment make themselves liable to punishment!
Barbados has been under US observation for some time. It is time to arrest more people once they are on holiday in the United States, put neck irons on them and sentence them to long prison terms.
“Barbados has been under US observation for some time. It is time to arrest more people once they are on holiday in the United States, put neck irons on them and sentence them to long prison terms.”
what an excellent idea…and they can start with the wicked, tiefing, traitorous, criminal fu*kers in the present government…that is why it is soooooo imperative that the electorate takes away those diplomatic passports and throw all their money laundering, drug trafficking…land stealing…treasury and pension raping asses out of the parliament…
@MoneyBrain
“… we should have mandatory “military service” for any young person that is not gainfully employed…”
+++++++++++++
Military type mindless obedience is a complete waste of any life. We need to teach young people how to innovate, NOT how to obey their elders who have failed them so miserably.
A year or two of “social service” is much more what is required… they should spend their time repairing the run down dwellings of so many senior citizens who live in poverty, building a bicycle trail along the route of the old train line, cooperatively building businesses in growing sectors of the economy like electric bicycles…
They should be learning by doing; the opposite of their wasted 5 years of secondary school, and the opposite of military marching up and down pointlessly while being yelled at by some loser on a power trip.
@Peter
We have to work our way out of a bad situation. We have to creep before being able to run.
“A year or two of “social service” is much more what is required”
Excellent…
Too many levels of criminality exists…most starts in government and extends outward to every tax payer funded entity. This is the nasty shite government ministers love to bathe in…
” Sharon Christie and the QEH
Sharon Christie is the Deputy Chair of the QEH Board. She effectively functions as the Chair due to the weakness and incompetence of Juliette Bynoe-Sutherland. Juliette is also subservient to white folks (Sharon is a white Bajan)
Sharon is also the CEO of Kensington Court Ltd, H Jason Jones Co and several related companies.
Since joining QEH Board, one of the companies that she manages has been given a contract to oversee QEH security including CCTV system. As Chair of the Tenders Committe she should have known better. So much for transparency under this new Government.
Secondly, Jason Jones is now becoming the supplier of first choice to the QEH. A blatant conflict of interest! But no one has the balls to stand up to her.
From her office at the QEH (?) she terrorizes the staff and fellow Board members. She threatens them by constantly stating that she is there to do what Mia wants done.
So once again a a select few are getting thru under this new Government whilst the rest of us suck salt.
It is time to tell Sharon Christie that Massa day done. It is time that such a disrespectful, arrogant person be removed from public service.
I also want to see an urgent investigation into the relation between QEH and all companies that Sharon Christie is associated with.”
@peterlawrencethompson March 24, 2019 7:17 AM “A year or two of “social service” is much more what is required.”
You are right as usual.
And we have to teach our children at home while they are still children how to look outside of themselves and how to “do” for others. I am glad that my father who did not go to school past the age of 12 showed us by example how to do that, and I am glad that I did the same with my children. I showed by example how a perfectly ordinary person can hold down a full time job, excellently raise two children, and find the love, time and passion to give to others for decade after decade. I won’t stop until I am disabled or dead.
Too many of us are too selfish. Too busy raising obese entitled children, too busy accumulating “stuff” which our children will dump on the landfill before we are cold.
How about Mia dumping all them million dollar consultants and put the money to the goodwill of educating the youth on the block
Putting in place technical and industrial schools geared to educating them into becoming productive citizens of this country
The monies that White Oaks and other consultants are receiving can go much further in preparing them for jobs and steering the youth away from a culture of crime
Yuh think that White Oaks ever or will ever bring to table any meaningful ideas for building a society where the betterment of the youth is put first
So far the evidence of what is happening on the street says NO
Meanwhile these multimilion dollar goriilaphants continue to eat off the tax payers trough and enjoying hearty bellies while the youth try to find ways of feeding theirs
@Barbados Underground Whistleblower March 24, 2019 12:29 AM “human trafficking—with young foreign girls fast becoming the preferred targets.”
What is wrong with this generation of Bajan men that they can’t seem to get sex without resorting to prostitutes. The old guys used to find a woman by their late teens and sex with her until 70 or past that, and that was in the age BEFORE Viagra. My old man got together with my mum when he was 19 and remained with her until 90, had all of his children with one woman and that was BEFORE the contraceptive pill, BEFORE Viagra, when the nearest shop which sold condoms was 5 miles walk away. And “no” the old man was not a church goer. Never stepped in a church until he was past 60. But those old men worked physically hard, ate ground food, dranked little or no alcohol, and did not take ANY drugs.
It seems like not a fella today can get a woman to willingly say “yes” to them for 60 years in a row. What has happened? Have our men become sexually incompetent? Are our men less sexy that their fathers and grandfathers?
So sexing was as easy as breathing.
@MoneyBrain March 24, 2019 4:33 AM “Note that countries that have mandatory military service have far more disciplined and successful societies.”
I note that Canada does NOT have mandatory military service and you have seemed comfortable enough hanging out there from the days of your youth.
@Simple Simon
You might have observed the topic is about discussing ways to improve our situation? It is easy to highlight the symptoms of the problem.
“It is time to tell Sharon Christie that Massa day done. It is time that such a disrespectful, arrogant person be removed from public service.”
It is also time to tell nasty Mia who loves bathing in racist and apartheid shite and splashing it on her own black people…,that massa day done..,,apparently as a middle age black ass woman…,she still dont want to accept that..,she too is subservient to racists..,.particularly of the white variety…
Mia said that many hands make for light work
However it seems that the manys hands she employed were placed in the wrong direction
Here eight months later ordinary citizens are trying to come to grips about the upsurge in crime and having to find solutions while govt use of Slogan to make a point of acceptance does nothing to rebuild or construct a decaying social enviroment
We the people were sold a bill of political solgans built on self interset nothing having to do with engineering meaningful thought that is benefical for the youth
Boy David Thompson must be rolling in his grave
constituency counsel gone
Football tournaments over
I wonder how many of the youth who found these groups to worthwhile in keeping them grounded now look into the streets for hope
All this sums up why barbados social enviroment would continue on a downward spiral
Those who have ears to hear let them hear
http://www.afrikanheritage.com/dispensers-of-hopelessness-raining-havoc-on-barbados/?fbclid=IwAR2ORNZ40afyaWQhFvkmIEgUdPlU7oQWcDZ4PD0HfUoh9ZsfdxjvfOBC6eI
@Lexicon March 24, 2019 6:03 AM “And in most countries mandatory military service is designed for males and not females.”
I trust that both you and moneybrain have noted that for the most part Bajan women at home and abroad are NOT killing anybody. And this is in spite of poverty, in spite of a higher unemployment rate that men, in spite of receiving no or little social or financial support for their children, in spite off violence inflicted on them by their fathers, stepfathers, boyfriends and husbands.
MALE violence IS THE PROBLEM. Men should therefore find the solution, but I am doubtful if they can. The men of Barbados are too arrogant, too know-it-all, too unwilling to listen to women. I wonder if the day will ever come when Bajan men will look to the women in their homes, their communities, their churches, their clubs, their political parties and ask them “How do you do it?” “How do you remain non-violent, in spite of the grossest provocations?”
@Waru
I have seen you put issues that if the average Barbadian thought deeply about them, people would be calling names as they march for change.
You strip the emperors of their clothes and put them on display.
But our folks prefer to pretend they are cerebral crabs in a boiling pot of water. The run after highfalutin talk and phrases; they would compare the economy, size and population of Barbados with richer, larger and more populous country and then sing praises of the finery of the emperor clothes.
I am glad that you have the stamina to continue to throw these issues into the lobby. The apologists will soon start swarming and attacking.
Don’t change your style. Nothing in that island will change if they don’t tackle what is wrong.
@Tron March 24, 2019 6:04 AM “The fact is that selling drugs is the only way to get rich quickly in Barbados.”
Can you explain to me why getting rich quickly is important or desirable?
Do people who get rich quickly live longer, happier or healthier lives?
The life expectancy of a low level Bajan drug dealer is about 30 years.
And the life expectancy of the high level drug dealer is less than that of a working class black Bajan woman. The high level drug dealers use their money to buy big rides so that they do not have to walk anywhere, to consume more alcohol and cocaine, to eat too much meat, so that they are lucky to make it to 80, even after they have paid American doctors hefty fees for their quadruple heart bypasses.
Black working class women in Barbados enjoy the healthiest, longest lives.
So what is the point?
Anybody ever see a white upper class Bajan man make it to 100? By the time they are 70 something they are drooling and a black working class woman is changing their diapers, and spoon feeding them.
Why is this?
“Anybody ever see a white upper class Bajan man make it to 100? By the time they are 70 something they are drooling and a black working class woman is changing their diapers, and spoon feeding them.
Why is this?”
Because KARMA loves a good laugh…lol
“I am glad that you have the stamina to continue to throw these issues into the lobby. The apologists will soon start swarming and attacking.”
Let them come..,am locked and cocked….they are much safer facing international agencies….as they will all come to learn.
The problem in Bim is that obviously very senior people in Bajan society are in charge of the drug trade, permit guns to enter the island and are only interested in benefiting financially. Bim is far too small for any major negative activity to take place without a properly trained police service being aware.
PLT, why do U think I placed “military service” in parentheses? My emphasis is on teaching Discipline and Education not tons of marching and certainly no shooting. I certainly agree with social service.
Sir SS, Canada needs “military service” too. Far too many lazyAss white people here who need a jolt of reality before China and India become their masters.
@ Money Brain March 24, 2019 9:18 AM
Finally someone who speaks the truth.
Now everyone is about to attack you, the other members of the establishment, accusing you of being unpatriotic, racist, disrespecting the culture of the locals and the like. They’re used to sticking their heads in the sand. If you live on an island for too long, your view will become very narrow and your perception a little clouded. I hold it there with Plato and his cave parable.
I refer here only to the local so-called economists, who seriously recommended a loan from China or Arabia for the solution of all local problems.
“Far too many lazyAss white people here who need a jolt of reality before China and India become their masters.”
So how is that a bad thing.,..given that they are working very hard to put themselves in that position.