Amina
Blackwood MeeksWHEN I first heard the news about the happenings over there in Braeton last week, my mind went directly to an Aesop fable we learnt in primary school. Not any of those which call upon us to stretch our imagination till it conceives the unspeakable. Like any of the stories from any of the sides in the case of Braeton. It was the one about the man who visited the land of the giants and emerged with "Seven at one blow" inscribed on his sword. Everyone who read it or heard about it cowered at the mention of his name or revered him for having done them a great favour. That is, until it was discovered that he had only killed seven flies.
The next day I was to discover that those who had been killed were indeed little more than small fries themselves. In more ways than one. A 15-year-old boy is not a man and carrying a gun does not make him one. We cannot afford to lose sight of that. Nor can we continue to regard our 15-year-olds as sinners who have suddenly descended to disturb the tranquillity of the saints. A 15-year-old boy with a gun has been facilitated, directly or indirectly, by far bigger fish. Someone older. Someone who has had more time than a few months as a "drop out" to become seasoned in the ways of crime. We have become skilled at catching de likkle fryers while the sharks escape to continue the hunt.
The inscription on the back glass of the bus coming down Mt. Rosser on Sunday read "Lead and let children follow." Maybe the driver did not intend it, but it certainly came to me as a comment on the present dilemma which leaves so many people over the age of majority (I cannot bring myself to say adults) joyous that seven youngsters have been extricated from our midst for allegations to which they can never speak. In time the police investigation may or may not be complete. In time we may or may not get the results.
Only one part of the question is about the police behaviour and what facilitates it. The next part is about how we are going to manifest as adults so that our children can enjoy being children, and so that we save our boys and find the means to facilitate their happy transition to adulthood? In short, what kind of leadership are we providing for our children?
Right now we provide enough of the kind which teaches that leaders are powerful people, that at the mention of their names others tremble, that to be a powerful man, man haffe be a bad man. "If him only wag him finga, if him only shake him head, yu an yu jab dis whole country fall dung dead." Man a bad man.
Does it really make a difference if the symbol of badness/power is the microphone that we hold or the weapon whose name we cannot even spell and which is sometimes too heavy for us to carry anyway? Whether the badness is trickling down or trickling up the country is in need of leadership that our children can follow. More and more we behave as if we wish that we did not really have to deal with them, that they and the problems would just disappear. At all social and economic levels of the society.
For example, how many of us know of any school where the administration and the parents cannot quite make up their minds about whose job it is to mould the child into an acceptable level of conduct? How many of us have heard at least one parent say that you cannot tell big people what to do and they mean their children, but they get on the phone and give detailed, unsolicited opinions about how their adult friends should conduct their lives? How many people insist on accountability from their spouses but "'low the children and give them space" till they end up in a place which is unreachable.
Meanwhile in Coronation Market, a woman rebukes a child for disrespecting his mother -- "Yu waan tun drop out so that police can come look fe yu", a fruit vendor on Red Hills declares that "God put wit inna man fe meck four walls an a door. A in deh we an we children fe deh." And I have worked with far too many youngsters who believe that until and unless they change their addresses they have little option but to become a bad man.
The point is that saving our boys requires a concerted, collective effort. If we do not conduct ourselves in a way which provides positive leadership for our children, which helps them to create a place that is safe for all, we are going to be forced to live in the world which they create from our bad examples or failure to provide any at all.
If we are serious about saving our boys, we cannot allow the Braeton case to lie, literally and figuratively, until we have learned how the entire society allowed it to happen.
And then, we have to be careful how we let the security forces believe that they have done us a favour with this seven at one blow. Even if they were not small fries and more so if they continue to spawn. We have to be careful how we lead our boys to believe that holding a gun is the most empowering thing which could happen to a man.
Amina Blackwood Meeks is a communications specialist.
