THE EDITOR, Sir:
IN AN address to budding writers late last year, Professor Edward Baugh quoted the American poet e.e. cummings, who had asked: "Why must/up every anus of a park/be stuck/a statue?" Though the esteemed professor was using these words in a different context, one cannot help but be struck by how much they strike a chord in Jamaica today with the debate raging over the unfortunate Emancipation Monument.
A park that was universally loved and admired by all Jamaicans has now been ruined by a pair of naked Brobdingnagian bronzes commissioned by the government. Various groups of Jamaicans have protested that this is not how they would like to be represented but to no avail. The government and by and large the media are deaf to their objections.
Ridiculous arguments are made to justify the nudity saying that in Europe this is par for the course etc. But in Europe many other things are par for the course that we would not dream of adopting merely because they do so in Europe; the legalisation of homosexuality and ganja for instance. What then is the rationale for such arguments?
There is another and better lesson to learn from the Europeans, i.e. When in Rome do as the Romans do. What this actually means is that local customs should be respected and upheld, not the opposite, i.e. when in Jamaica do as the Romans (and the Greeks) did which is what our Europhiles seem to be suggesting.
I am etc.,
ALIENA PUN
ses@uwimona.edu.jm
Mary Seacole Hall
UWI, Mona
