By Amina Blackwood Meeks, Contributor 
Blackwood Meeks
DE S(IN)TING that happened to all of us at the 20th renewal of what some claim to be the greatest one-night reggae show on earth was the featured act on the front page of all the newspapers on December 28, 2003.
It also occupied a fair amount of time on talk radio, at least in the early part of the week and word of mouth passa-passa certainly did a fair amount of embroidering and manufacturing of details during the week. And for those of us who might have forgot, it was just a mouse-click away from the rest of the world.
RAE TOWN STREET DANCE
On that very Sunday night though, the Rae Town Street Dance celebrated its twenty-first anniversary great music, people who love dance jus a dance, people who love sip jus a sip and, to quote Miss Lou, "Not a stone was fling, not a bad wud sting, not a soul gwaan bad an low-rated." And in this millennium age of celebrating lunacy, nat a pitcha pan a front page, not one headline, no interview pan no talk show and I don't even know how many people even hear by rumour that one of the RJR communications group carried at least sections of the wonderful vibes live. Me haffe ask like Oku Onoura "Is what dis ya society yah a defen?"
De S(in)ting that happened out at JamWorld Entertainment Centre is just a reflection of a complex and complicated malady that ails us all. I was watching On Stage on CVM television the week before the show when Mr. Laing was engaged in a promotional interview. I nearly roll outa my bed when de man inform de nation that for a few years in the beginning, and while he was still in the police force, he ran the show and the police never know sey is him was the force behind it. Me wonder out loud what that was supposed to teach me about any number of activities police could be involved in and police nuh know!
I am not splitting any hairs about "oh, but dis did different. Is jus a likkle entertainment." The splitting of hairs in Jamaica is a big part of we problem. We split hairs till we splinter every principle that could ever lead us back to sanity and mostly what remains is expediency.
Last year at the same show expediency sey we shudda glad dat Ninja Man hand over the gun to Missa Adams and forget about all the other implications. Me personally glad sey dis year wassen laas year for, who knows, Bounty Killa famous line "People Dead" might well have replaced the "Terror at Sting" headlines.
My son Neto sey de whole ting represent to him a failure to respect elders. Every artiste have a next artiste dat dem grow up listening to or watching and wanting to be like. Dem happy and sometimes nervous and overawed to be on the same stage as such a artiste.
GRAND DADDY OF DANCEHALL
The best thing that can happen to them, no matter how de crowd rail, is for dem idol to tell dem "well done". So how come, him trying to figure out, Vybz Cartel, the virtual baby of the pack, cudda challenge Ninja Man, the grand daddy of dancehall, not just lyrically but physically?
I tell my son dat de answer is in the very formulation of what him sey de sting represent this society has slowly distanced itself from what it means to respect elders. I have heard disc jockeys on afternoon radio proposing that certain musicians/singers/DJs should retire not because they no longer create anything of worth but because "is young people time" an de youngsters want "to eat a food outa de business too." Double whammy.
Discredited on the basis of age. Discredited at the food trough because of limited resources whether you still have merit or not. And here is the rub, respect is not an automatic something, it must be earned. And elders must take responsibility for the quality of the example they set. We are all role models whether that is our conscious intention or not. Yu caan plant peas and reap corn.
BRUK ONE ANEDDA NOSE
The way I see it, two entertainers up pan stage wid dem various supporters a bruk one anedda nose not really so fundamentally different from two politicians from different parties package and purvey de worse kind of verbal abuse against each other with dem followers tekking up cudgel and stones,
bottles and gunshots in the name of winning a war for the most votes. Or the right to represent the people who fling de most and shed de most blood.
Somebody has appropriated, packaged and has been profiting from the purveying of violence and the worst of which we are capable as "culture" and "entertainment".
The line of (ir)responsibility includes all those who own the resources to make it happen the owners of recording studios, producers, distributors, sound system operators, entertainment reporters, disc jockeys and radio station managers who sometimes seem to be asleep or dead to what is given airplay on their stations at all hours of the day and night. And it includes those people who abandon the sanctuary of their gated and secure up-town communities, their leather executive high-heel shoes and jacket and tie office suites just often enough and briefly enough to descend into what is the latest rage, emphasis on rage, later to be justified in their verandah talk about the nature of those people down there who know no other way but to cannibalise themselves. Poor black people end up wrong, end up as grist for de mill no matter how yu look at it. Somebody has to take the bull by the horn to return the whole nation to sanity, to a place where terror is not entertaining.
I salute Mayor George Lee for his stated intention to ensure good sense in his backyard. I would like to see entertainment reporters spend less time titillating us with the various versions of who wrong and who right in these all too regular happenings, give less air time to young women gyrating on the tops of people's motor cars and denying them free passage "as part of the fun" at some of the new rage street sessions, and just a toops more time to events like the Rae Town Street Dance.
I would like to see Tony Rebel, Coco Tea, Luciano, Anthony B, Determine, Marcia Griffiths, Morgan Heritage, Buju Banton, Bunny Wailer, Tanya Stephens and a host of other positive, uplifting, gifted and inspiring native Jamaican musicians and singers, along with poets and storytellers, vintage and new, on the same stage, once per month, in a different parish each month for the year 2004.
HEALING
This should be facilitated to contribute to the healing of this nation with the power of their words and their music. I would like to see the Government make it possible it through the Ministry with responsibility for Culture. I would like to see the private sector fund it and just pretend sey is Carnival for all the potential returns on what would in fact be their investment in advertising.
I would like to see the Ministry with responsibility for Tourism use it to rake in the millions we need to balance the budget and meck more bread so we haffi stop cannibalise we one anedda over de dwindling likkle slice.
Odderwise de whole a unnu stap run up unnu mout bout we infinite possibilities for being the greatest little nation this side of paradise, an cut out de likkle tokenism of beg positive artiste fe endorse public education campaigns with some likkle public service announcements dat doan even get enough funding fe play often enough to be worth the while of creating them. That's what artistes should be facilitated to do by the way, create, make something out of nothing, help shape a brighter future for all of us. And the rest of us should stop applauding and celebrating their disintegration.
At least in the field of entertainment we could make it a good and decent new year.
"Or did you mean what you say, are you skanking?"
Hon. Robert Nesta Marley
