THE EDITOR, Sir:A RECENT Gleaner editorial declared "Enough is enough."
To show how much of a problem crime has become in Jamaica, one did not need to read the contents of the editorial that it was referring to crime.
So frequent and so horrendous has crime in Jamaica become that it is near impossible to say anything new or make any plea that has not yet been made relative to this problem. Without a fundamental change in the way we all view our responsibility for making the country free of these perverse criminal elements, it is as good as a lost cause.
In a book written by Karl Jaspers asserting the universal culpability of all Germans for the Nazi atrocities of World War II, the author says: "There exists among men, because they are men, a solidarity through which each shares responsibility for every injustice and every wrong committed in the world, and especially for crimes that are committed in his presence or of which he cannot be ignorant. If I do not do what I can to prevent them, I am an accomplice in them."
I am not sure if any of us can claim to have done everything possible to prevent what has been happening to many of our fellow Jamaicans and we certainly cannot claim ignorance. Instead we have hidden from our collective responsibility under the pretext of various quasi-justifiable reasons. But I would warn that there is a precariousness to the kind of existence where we stand idly by while our brothers and sisters are slaughtered daily.
Another famous quote referring to the danger of staying silent in the face of obvious crimes puts it this way: "First they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for the communists, and I did not speak out because I was not a communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I did not speak out because I was not a Catholic. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me."
With what has been going on in Jamaica the quote might be paraphrased to say: "First they came for the bus driver on Mountain View Avenue, and I did not speak out because I was not a bus driver. Then they came for the poor woman and her children in Rema, and I did not speak out because I was not poor nor did I live in Rema. Then they came for the old man in August Town, and I did not speak out because I did not live in August Town..."
I do not think I need to go any further here, the conclusion is obvious. If only in the name of self-preservation, we all need to start acting now.
I am, etc.,
SHELDON LYN
sllyn@hotmail.com
Via Go-Jamaica
