While a handful of hotels on Barbados have been very proactive in reaching out to locals and residents for Staycation options at attractive rates, despite some recent discussion, there appears no national initiative driving this important tactic to help the path of tourism recovery.
Perhaps equally discouraging is that our banks and financial institutions seem to be unaware of the potential to grow credit and debit card usage by offering enhanced cash back incentives to promote local tourism, which in themselves are self-funding.
What is abundantly obvious is that many would-be overseas visitors are delaying future booking, until some sort of normality returns to definite flight possibilities, rather than again risk going through the prolonged refund process that thousands are still trying to extract for previously confirmed flights and holidays.
Obviously, it is largely out of our control to secure airlift in the current ever changing circumstances from traditional markets, until infection rates are significantly reduced or eliminated, and the general public has the confidence to travel again.
The LIAT debacle has virtually ruled out welcoming back any possible early return of significant numbers of intra Caribbean visitors, despite the relatively low risk of Covid-19 spread within the region.
Many also find it difficult to understand how Governments, over decades, have ploughed hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars into supporting the airline, only now to see it liquidated with all the consequences that brings to those involved.
Therefore simply put, perhaps the only meaningful source of business which presently remains, is the domestic market. It is not just about our accommodation providers, but across the entire sector.
From my feedback, people are questioning if Government sincerely wishes to avoid further closures of tourism partners and enable these businesses to re-open and protect employment, that the administration has to play their part in removing room levies and VAT (value added tax), at least in the short term.
The British Government obviously considered this policy was critical to aiding the hospitality industry recovery in the United Kingdom by announcing days ago the lowering of the VAT rate from 20 to 5 per cent until January 2021on restaurants, pubs and other leisure outlets and introduction of specially priced meals, rather like our 19 year old re-DISCOVER initiative.
Ultimately there are so many ways Government can wrest taxes and if those businesses remain closed and unable to meet their financial obligations, then clearly, they cannot contribute to national recovery.
While, thankfully, one closed restaurant was recently re-opened, under new ownership, no mention has been made of several others that have already been forced to close their doors ‘indefinitely’, resulting in the loss of dozens of jobs. This closure trend will inevitably continue unless some corrective measures are put into place urgently.
Over the last years ‘we’ have spent a fortune rightly boasting we are the culinary Capital of the Caribbean. Let us now, not lose this hard earned reputation, simply by failing to respond to the immediate needs of those who have made it possible.
@ peterlawrencethompson July 17, 2020 7:04 PM
Self-irony is a sign of modesty.
@ NorthernObserver July 17, 2020 8:00 PM
$2,000 is a lot of money. Our government should at least provide private health insurance for that. A nice champagne reception at the airport and a free driver’s license would also be good. Last but not least it would be appropriate if our expats could credit the 2000 dollars against the land tax.
@Trong
You must be an expat, as they are frequently top of your mind.
https://barbadostoday.bb/2020/07/18/bajans-miffed-at-jetblue-cancellation-while-us-covid-19-rates-soar/
Would love to come ‘home’, but I have to agree with the government policy.
Keep your eyes on private and charter planes as well. You might get a kick in the ass from that group.
The Government’s new Bill in support of its Barbados Welcome Stamp is called the Remote Employment Bill (REBILL), 2020.
There is a fee of $4k for individuals and $6k for families; If more than one person in the family wishes to work they will each pay a fee of $4k.
The government has sabotaged what should have been an innovative billion dollar industry by refusing to do the appropriate market research. This is a tragic betrayal of the advice that they have been given. It’s atrocious.
@PLT
I have said on numerous occasions that the president does not do details. She is a PR freak, as long as there is an interview in north America or Europe she is there, speaking with her hands and pointing. Then it is promoted as a great achievement. The president is not as clever as her fans claim.
I have worked with these journalists for decades, some of them I have trained, and cannot see what is the great achievement. @PLT do not give them anymore of your ideas.
@Hal
The ideas are not for the government. The ideas are for the people of Barbados.
@Peter
We live here, we must not give up on our civic duty.
It is a Bill, there is time to lobby for changes to take place.
#perseverance
@PLT
The government is the guardian of implementation. If they are dishonest, then the policy will be flawed. Don’t let so-called patriotism blind you to theft of ideas. If we are all in this together, then there must be reciprocation. Don’t take this robbery sitting down. Protest.
The government ministers and supporting apparatus mirrors the will of the people. If there is dysfunction the people have to act to effect change within the system.
Initially the amounts touted for processing the applications were lower than those posted by PLT. The Gov’t will hold a farce of a debate and probably lower the fees as a symbol of its compromise and to signal to interested parties that they are getting a “deal”. There may even be other changes, if there is anything that this Gov’t is good at is the ability to pass “force ripe” legislation only to amend it when they are faced with ridicule by the public.
Wuh looka muh crosses! PLT good to see your idea got picked up by the “President”.
@plt
Seems many places are jumping in the same bandwagon, even large countries, who too have major revenue shortfalls.
These fees will eventually be ” negotiated out”. If someone is silly enough not to negotiate, then their money will gladly be accepted. If fees chase them away, then they don’t understand most of their ‘temporary new homes’ and life there.
The Bermudans will charge US$263 instead of US$2k. They are apparently a lot smarter than we are (or they read my blog more carefully).
http://wunnuh.org/tourism-is-a-dead-horse/
Here is the media report on the competitive Bermudan product.
http://www.foreverbermuda.com/minister-one-year-residency-certificate-policy/
Here is the Remote Employment Act 2020.
(Quote):
Wuh looka muh crosses! PLT good to see your idea got picked up by the “President”. (Unquote).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The proposal of Special Entry permits to entice people (and their modern families) primarily from Western metropolises to come to live in and work in or from Barbados has its genesis under the previous administration as announced during the presentation of the former MoF’s “Financial Statement & Budgetary Proposals” of August 2013.
This was a proposal which should have been pursued with the utmost of zeal to make Barbados stand out as a place to conduct ‘real’ business in a relaxed, safe, healthy and fully equipped tropical paradise.
What PLT has done- and cleverly so, with his fresh pair of politically-untainted eyes- is to put some ‘attractively-looking’ meat to the dormant skeleton; albeit unknowingly, to make it into a Covid-constrained but viable project ready for fruition to replace some of the heavy loss of business from the traditional tourism sector.
The suggestion of including ‘special’ provisions for nomad workers operating in cyberspace to reflect current technological realities ought to be pursued with utmost haste and not just plagiarized and propagandized for political grandstanding .purposes.
However, for PLT’s ‘innovation’ to become a ‘practicable’ and attractive’ model of remote working in cyberspace while enjoying the environment of a healthy Barbados a few legislative deterrents must be removed from the back of the pandemic-trotting horse to which you are trying to hitch your forex earning wagon.
The question is how long is it going to take to implement the necessary changes before other jurisdictions- competing for the same category of potential forex-producing special visitors and working nomads- offer more attractive conditions which not only allow them to work efficiently in cyberspace but also do not offend their morally open-minded sensitivities or ‘human rights’ entitlement while they are physically staying in Barbados.
“One can steal ideas, but no one can steal execution or passion” – Tim Ferriss.
Miller July 18, 2020 12:52 PM
“One can steal ideas, but no one can steal execution or passion” – Tim Ferriss.
+++++++++++++++++
Understanding this basic concept is 51% of a top flight MBA.
@ peterlawrencethompson July 18, 2020 7:08 AM
PLT,
Now, with the idiotic implementation of your well-intentioned proposal, you can see for yourself why Barbados has had zero economic growth since 2008. It’s not because of popular excuses like slavery, colonialism, weather or sick mum, but because of a lack of basic financial skills, greed, arrogance and the belief that foreigners are some kind of golden goose or that they are even responsible for the local decline.
Better implementation abroad? Of course, the governments of all other CARICOM countries are smarter – they have much higher economic growth.
And what are Barbadians doing? Instead of looking for the flaw in local governance and business culture (poor work ethic, excessive taxes and the like), they call for a hunt for minorities (“don’t buy from white people”). Of course, it is much more convenient to look for the fault in other people.
With this kind of governance, we will remain the economic tail light of the Caribbean in the long run.
@ peterlawrencethompson July 18, 2020 12:12 PM
The gross national product of Bermudas is much higher than that of Barbados. Now you know why.
I really hope this episode will open some people’s eyes. It’s not the history or the color of the skin, it’s the here and now. There is no black and white politics, no capitalist and communist, but only good and bad.
@Tron July 18, 2020 1:33 PM
It is no surprise to me that the Bermuda has proven more adept at stealing my idea than the Barbados has… after all, Bermuda is still a part of the British Empire: stealing is the cornerstone upon which the British Empire is built, it is their core value and most prized skillset.
There is no culture that the world has ever produced that could match the British for their skill and dedication to stealing, theft, plunder, rip-off, burglary, larceny, embezzlement, thievery, holdup, duplicity, pilfering, mugging, etc. I mean, look how many words their language had to evolve for the many nuances of their skill. Stealing is to the British what snow is to the Inuit… it is the environment in which they live and breath and have their being.
PLT,
All countries with a high GDP must overcome certain moral hurdles … LOL. There is nothing stopping us from becoming just as smart in Barbados!
What I have in mind is a government in the style of the Chinese company Tencent, in other words a state copy cat. We only copy what works well on the other islands, but we improve our offer.
Thanks s for sharing the ‘Remote Employment Act’ link.
I will assume that all dollars are Barbados dollars. If that is the case then US $50K may be too low of a bar.
With US taxes, accommodation, health insurance, transportation (airfare), registration fees and cost of living in Barbados this may make this a non-starter for such a low wage person. Hippie tourists with a job and a computer.
@ vPeterlawrencethompson July 18, 2020 1:47 PM
“There is no culture that the world has ever produced that could match the British for their skill and dedication to stealing, theft, plunder, rip-off, burglary, larceny, embezzlement, thievery, holdup, duplicity, pilfering, mugging, etc. I mean, look how many words their language had to evolve for the many nuances of their skill. Stealing is to the British what snow is to the Inuit… it is the environment in which they live and breath and have their being.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Well put! An apt description of Britain and its peoples ‘stemming’ from the days of Queen Elizabeth 1 and Sir Francis Drake.
There is nothing about Britain- other than the conniving wits of her ruling class which you succinctly described- that should entitle that island state to punch above its ‘natural-resources-endowed’ weight.
Now you can gauge where the copycat offshoot called Barbadoes inherited its ‘perceived’ gumption which Hal Austin ‘innocently’ refers to as the “Bajan Condition”.
Clearly, there is more to your intellectual side than what both you and our own BU John Knox were exposed to at that ‘Bajan conditioning’ institution of H C which Hal Austin perceives as being worse than growing up stupid under the Union Jack while despising the fact of being trapped in the Castle of his own black Skin.
Enuff,
Obviously our clueless natives designed the law themselves, trying to save the money for a proper foreign adviser.
It is best if we point out on the application form in capital letters that Bermuda and CARICOM countries offer comparable services much cheaper.
Facing an overwhelming unemployment rate of close to 40 per cent, a dramatic decline in revenue and concerns over social decay, Minister of Tourism and International Transport Kerrie Symmonds said Barbados had very little choice but to start welcoming commercial flights.
https://barbadostoday.bb/2020/07/18/country-has-to-adjust-to-a-covid-19-environment/
unemployment rate of close to 40 per cent,
Miller
I first saw the idea here on BU compliments of PLT, as I can remember the big debate was about tourism and its future. Soon after PLT had an article in the newspaper. Then BTMI, BHTA or one of them mentioned it. I repeat, good to see PLT’s idea being picked up. So go throw your barbs at the government. Now fuq off!
The tourists will not return in large numbers so quickly.
Our Marxist gov advisors are doing everything they can to sabotage tourism with excessive tourist fees (latest example: one-year-stay). These Marxists deliberately drove LIAT to ruin through high taxes.
In addition, with the Nelson riots, the boycott campaign against Barbadian entrepreneurs (buy only from blacks, don’t buy from Jews, uh whites) and the increasing general xenophobia of the opposition and outspoken activists, Barbados risks a permanent travel warning.
I hope that Mia Mottley recognizes this undesirable development in time and initiates countermeasures to get our very important emplyoees in the tourism sector back to their jobs. The recent legislation on the one-year ticket for expats is a clear sign that our beloved leader Mia Mottley must finally dismiss those Marxist traitors who are deliberately sabotaging Barbados.
@ PLT
I am astonished that you would state:
“Mottley’s brilliant new initiative will enable Barbados to build a globally competitive industry, worth billions of dollars in foreign exchange annually, around the opportunity to host a Barbados resident independent workforce who are employed in Europe and North America. We have already built a valuable brand to attract them and we already have attractive infrastructure to accommodate them.“
In my humble opinion declaring that the British are thieves, with which I agree, is one thing , but to actually aid and abet another in thievery is the same thing. You must know that the above statement , made by you is patently false. You know that it was not “ Mottley’s brilliant idea“ yet you go on your blog and give her credit for your idea. Once more, we witness why our country is now rift with cynicism. A few posts back , I asked you were you are so reluctant yo claim credit and your response was that you are fortunate enough that you don’t have to wonder where your next meal comes from. Does this also allow you to engage in misleading the public and basically sheltering the PM from being publicly ridiculed for what is obviously theft?
@William Skinner,
Read it carefully… I said “Mottley’s brilliant new initiative…” (which is based on my idea).
@WS
Trying hard to comment but cannot find the words.
Found a word though
Aspiration
Now I have to look it up to see what it means
@ PLT
You make your point with all the spin of an in flight Lance Gibbs with the shadows crossing the pitch. You are always a gentleman. Thanks for your response.
Its good to see PLT’s (and to some extent William Skinner’s) development from their insistent words in May on BU where they were adamant that Tourism was totally dead in Barbados and merited no attempt at resuscitation, to their new acceptance that something had to be done. Check out the May archives.
Its very interesting what changes 2 months hath wrought!
@Lyall
It is about how we have to reimagine tourism. We many in the disaspora who prefer to hideaway in a tropical paradise they were born. Especially the USA which seem to have gotten it wrong.
Start by having less killings. I know it doesnt amt to a weekend in chicago but its tourist money you want
Lyasmall
Only recently the said William Skinner poured scorn on the idea of climate and low covid rates in Bim being a potential magnet for tourists. I guess he forgot PLT was pushing it in his long-stay for techies initiative. Who de cat likes, he licks.
@ Enuff
There you go again. It was you talking pure crap about the villa segment saving the day. I said and will continue today that this idea about tourism bouncing back in less than three or four years is a sham. What PLT came up with was a creative idea to offset the reality that I envisioned.
In other words while people like you blinded by a perverse party loyalty, were foolishly trying to convince intelligent people that all we had to do was go backwards and reap some imaginary whirlwind.
So let me repeat: Unless we change direction in the post COVID period the dog done dead. I don’t care who running the country cause it’s six and half dozen.
Use your time wisely, we have to get employment back to pre COVID numbers.
Make PLT Minister of Tourism and stay in your lane. You are sadly out of depth right now.
WS
I never said anything about a quick bounce back. I argued that human nature and the reason why people travel will lead to tourism not being dead due to Covid as was being proclaimed by many on BU. On villas, I said because they allow people to quarantine/self-isolate they would be the first to rebound. I wonder where well-off techies would choose to stay, if not villas? If you had stayed in your lane, you would not have lost your deposit.
@lyallsmall July 19, 2020 8:27 AM
“It’s good to see PLT’s (and to some extent William Skinner’s) development from their insistent words in May on BU where they were adamant that Tourism was totally dead in Barbados…”
+++++++++++++++++++
I still think that tourism is totally dead in Barbados. I said it in March and April and all the data that I have collected since just reinforces that conclusion.
In April I was searching for a way to use the competitive advantages that Barbados has in order to soften the economic depression that is upon us. It is all well and good to dream about postindustrial technologies, but Barbados has not yet developed a competitive advantage in those fields, so initiatives like TEN Habitat’s Source Code Developer Academy will take a while to bear fruit.
Our only globally recognised competitive advantages are cricket talent, and our enviable social and climatic environment. I cannot figure out a way to make cricket talent pay billions of dollars a year, but I realized that the pandemic was changing global work culture in a way that we could exploit our climate to advantage.
What nobody seems to realize yet is that the new industry is NOT TOURISM. Having people live here and work abroad is an entirely different industry: this is a new product, in a new industry, part of a new marketplace, for new clients, with new requirements. Tourism is based upon escape from the tourists normal life— living here and working abroad is based upon inventing a NEW normal. The tourism model is based upon coddling people in an alienated bubble of pampering and lazing about. The living here and working abroad model is based upon integrating people into normal life and helping them enhance their productivity.
Would it be fair to say Peter that a lot of those hotels and condos for rent have paid for themselves many times over….over the years
Dominican republic gets 700000 canadian tourists a year barbados 60000 even though the flight time is insignificant its all about the money , I stay at palm beach often but its a morgue if I want fun I go to coconut court, its a blast. The crane no-better sure its pretty but again quite lame people want to have fun on a holiday they dont come to rub elbows with the swish, Nicky beach is not for normal people change your focus the DR went from 4 million to 6 million people a year in visits in a short time everybody likes the hope diamond but the money is in the little engagement rings.
@ Enuff
“What nobody seems to realize yet is that the new industry is NOT TOURISM. Having people live here and work abroad is an entirely different industry: this is a new product, in a new industry, part of a new marketplace, for new clients, with new requirements. Tourism is based upon escape from the tourists normal life— living here and working abroad is based upon inventing a NEW normal. The tourism model is based upon coddling people in an alienated bubble of pampering and lazing about. The living here and working abroad model is based upon integrating people into normal life and helping them enhance their productivity.“ Quote @ PLT
Read and learn my dear boy…….read and learn. Silly pot shots can’t work in this “ NEW” environment. Back to school for you and your BLPDLP jokers.
Read and learn……. it’s a new day . We have 40 % unemployment. We need ideas.
Put the money into creating / developing 5000 small businesses . Each business employs a minimum of two persons. Immediately create thousands of jobs. Even with a 25 % failing rate , we would still bring down employment. I told the idiots in the DLP in 2016 to embark on a massive road rehabilitation program , they did not listen. Now I am telling the idiots in the BLP how to create 3000 jobs overnight. I know Mia likes other people’s ideas- ask @PLT.
May you and your family have a great Sunday my brother.
@Lawson July 19, 2020 10:16 AM
With the world in the deepest economic depression of the past two centuries the tourism industry is not going to recover to those numbers within a decade, if ever. Good riddance. I do not want millions of budget tourists destroying the Barbados environment. I only want the money spent in Barbados with the smallest possible environmental footprint.
PLT;
Pure semantics! You can’t change a major activity (Tourism) into a new unnamed one by merely changing the time frame for all the essential aspects of that activity from days to 1 year while using most of the existing resources created for and by that activity.
You said above:-
I still think that tourism is totally dead in Barbados. I said it in March and April and all the data that I have collected since just reinforces that conclusion. …..In April I was searching for a way to use the competitive advantages that Barbados has in order to soften the economic depression that is upon us. It is all well and good to dream about postindustrial technologies, but Barbados has not yet developed a competitive advantage in those fields, so initiatives like TEN Habitat’s Source Code Developer Academy will take a while to bear fruit. Our only globally recognised competitive advantages are cricket talent, and our enviable social and climatic environment. ……..
You said What nobody seems to realize yet is that the new industry is NOT TOURISM.
Having people live here and work abroad is an entirely different industry: this is a new product, in a new industry, part of a new marketplace, for new clients, with new requirements. Tourism is based upon escape from the tourists normal life— living here and working abroad is based upon inventing a NEW normal. The tourism model is based upon coddling people in an alienated bubble of pampering and lazing about. The living here and working abroad model is based upon integrating people into normal life and helping them enhance their productivity.
I get it that you think that you have to totally discredit the whole idea of tourism to build up the importance of your untested brainchild but you don’t have to do that. The new project is not really a potential new industry but rather an activity born of the ravages of all aspects of our tourism wreaked by Covid-19.
Having said the above I wish you well re. the implementation of the idea and look forward to it being eventually recognized as being a major aspect of the raising of the economy from the ashes some years from now.
@lyallsmall July 19, 2020 10:40 AM
It’s not semantics, but I’m not surprised that you don’t understand, nobody in government does either. I don’t give a damn what it is called… call it whatever you like. The point however, is that if we treat these new clients as we have been used to treating tourists, we will fail to grow the industry to its potential.
How do I know this? Simple: I have spent the past few months conducting in depth interviews with people in this market segment. It is not a magical process to discover how to serve a specific market segment: you find them, you ask them open ended questions, and you listen to them. They do not want hotel rooms. They do not want daily housekeeping services. They do not want a villa with a chef and staff. They do not want the majority of activities and attractions that we configure for tourists.
I also know what they do want; but perhaps I should not tell anyone without charging them my usual US$300/hr, because nobody seems to value my advice unless they have paid through the nose for it.
PLT;
Let me express my heartfelt commendations, FWLIW, to you for the work that you have done and continue to do re. the fleshing out of the big Idea. However, I understand that I am also dealing in semantics re. your insistence that Tourism as we know it is now dead in Barbados even though the Government and many of the people who worked in the tourism sector (both in Barbados and its client countries) are still holding on to a possibility that Tourism can arise like a phoenix from the ashes in an indeterminate time frame.
Do you realise that it makes no sense whatsoever for Government or the Private Sector entities that are heavily involved and invested in various aspects of Tourism to accept the proposition that Tourism is dead and already buried and there is no hope for its resuscitation?
I know very little of the Tourism sector but I would be very surprised if you could find any one in that sector, or in Government, who could accept your implicit proposition that Tourism is already dead and that therefore no effort or money should be put into it
@ PLT
They certainly don’t want bagels; they don’t want to wake up to country and western music; they don’t want concocted local dishes with spanish names;they don’t want garbage being collected on St Lawrence Gap in the afternoons.
What about authentic Bajan dinner and then a local production at the Daphney Hackett theatre? What about an early morning radio show for young adult tourists at some hotels; how about some cooking classes on how we season meats and fish. Years ago goat racing was a big draw at the Hilton.
The only way to save tourism is to market Barbados and not try to market what the tourist already have.
We cannot pretend it’s business as usual. You are absolutely correct. The tourism industry as we we knew it is now dead. The economy has to be rebuilt and common sense tells me that there is not enough talent in either the DLP or the BLP that can really do it. I hope that they prove me wrong.
Translation
Tourism industry (WS) – the whole shebang – dead
Tourism (PLT) – inflow of customers – dead
Tourist sector (lyall) -hotel owners/government – not seeing tourism or the tourist industry as dead
Kind reminder: Lazarus was raised from the dead
@ TheOGazerts
We need to be realists. From where I stand there seems to be no new thinking. No wonder they stole @ PLT project.
However, we must give the administration a fair chance because it is governing in very difficult times and the opposition ,both inside and outside , are not offering any new ideas . That is also cause for concern. Just critiquing government policy is not enough. They should have formulated alternative ideas at this time. My conclusion: Jokers in and jokers out.
How can you steal an idea that was deposited in the public space by a Barbadian who wanted it to be adopted? The discussion is about the best design of the initiative to achieve bang for buck.
The initiative of PLT is a good start but we need more. Above all, we need many more expats who build villas and stay with us for more than a year.
As this group is much more important for Barbados than all politicians, advisors, public servants and judges combined (they only consume but do not bring foreign currency into the country), it would be only fair to exempt this group from the land tax and any other taxes.
@ peterlawrencethompson July 19, 2020 10:54 AM
PLT,
you’ve obviously been in countries with compliance policies too long. In the Caribbean it works like this: You offer your consulting services for an official 600 USD per hour and pay your client 200 USD per hour as a kick-back.
That is why there are more consultants than ants in Barbados.
Oh what a nasty word…kick back…finder’s fee, success fee (the white oak verbage) or rebate sounds so much more sanitary
WS
Boss over the past 2months I have been privy to discussions about 4 hotels–2 budget and 2 high end. I don’t have time to waste with you. I am staying in my lane.
@ Enuff July 19, 2020 5:23 PM
“WS
Boss over the past 2months I have been privy to discussions about 4 hotels–2 budget and 2 high end.”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Are these hotels being ‘discussed’ to accommodate the digital nomads queuing up to invade the oasis called Barbados thanks to PLT and not the MAM?
Is that in Barbados (including the Four Seasons, Hyatt Lighthouse, Blue Horizon and the Harlequin relics sans Silver Sands) or in some metropolis where you are in the chair of some imaginary PR company to act of head hunter for these nomads?
Don’t you have even an iota of intellectual integrity and moral respect about you?
You need to stop with your lies if only for the sake of your ass-licking political soul.
Yes, go ahead and do your usual; cuss while sucking ya blackened teets. (Stupese!)
PS: When are you, the gaseous vent for an as***hole of the current administration, going to say “Sorry” to Caswell Franklyn on BU?
Poor fella. Keep clutching.🤣🤣🤣
https://barbadosunderground.files.wordpress.com/2020/07/wickham.png
Source: Nation Newspaper
You steal an idea when you deny the original source of that idea and try to appropriate it as your own. Acknowledging the source (even in academic writing we have references and footnotes to add legitimacy and credibility in journalism we use quotation marks), does not mean not utilising the idea.
When @plt began his ideas, apart from health care, my other big concern was attitudes and laws relating to the LGBTQ groups.
Because Barbadians are largely homophobic, and actual enforcement of laws rare, you get the ‘yeah, yeah, yeah’ responses.
I have become convinced over time, Barbadians have no idea how odious some of these laws are in 2020. All they do is cite persons publicly known to fall within LGBTQ, and how they exist “well”. Totally oblivious to the many who research Barbados, and discover the negative press it receives from LGBTQ friendly sites. “steupse…we don’t need dem”?
I know a couple who visited multiple times annually for 15+ years. Then a child “came out” and encouraged them to go elsewhere because of these oppressive laws. The net spreads far and wide.
Legalise marijuana for recreational use.
Change the buggery law to make it legal for consenting adults to engage in such activity.
Starting to like how Trudeau makes you feel eh Hants
Northern,
It would be best if we marketed Barbados as an ideal holiday destination for Taliban, Wahabis and clerical-fascist American evangelicals. These three groups do not differ very much and fit to the native, backward population on the island.
What does PLT think about the problem?
@Hants
Repeal the law. No mention = legal. Fear is a wild motivator. Remove all potential obstacles which serve no purpose.
@Trong
I cannot recall he had an opinion. He is very capable of expressing himself.
Because Barbadians are largely homophobic, and actual enforcement of laws rare, you get the ‘yeah, yeah, yeah’ responses.
I have become convinced over time, Barbadians have no idea how odious some of these laws are in 2020…..(Quote)
The Bajan Condition – ie predictable behaviour?
Is there discrimination against gays in Bim? It depends on who you ask but in the Barbados I grew up in there were always gays both male and female who lived their lives largely without fear from their neighbours. They were gays in every echelon of society and the laws against homosexuality were more honored in the breach than the observance after all this is a country that had a contest “Queen of the Bees” back in the days before anyone ever heard of “gay rights”.
This is a country of many faces, whether it is opposition to nude beaches, casino gambling, camouflage clothing the list goes on…….
BTW has anyone in the cabinet voiced opposition to gay marriage, just as some voiced opposition to legalization of marijuana?
No reason for the song……..
I don’t know, is there discrimination? What I do know, is the archaic laws create a perception in certain groups. And perception, has a nasty habit of becoming their reality. And there are enough stories in the public domain to support these perceptions.
Get rid of the laws, and you get rid of bad press and concerns which can have nothing but a negative impact.
@ Sargeant July 22, 2020 3:14 PM
“opposition to nude beaches, casino gambling, camouflage clothing the list goes on…”
Our unemployment rate is 40 percent, but our archaic Taliban still live in the 1950s. It is almost a miracle that in Barbados women are allowed to drive a car themselves.