Thompson
IN HIS article entitled 'A Free Ride on the Back of Education', which appeared on December 26, 2004 issue of The Gleaner, Bishop Howard Gregory sees my call for the legalisation of casinos, the proceeds to be used to help fund education, as being opportunistic and part of a campaign by the casino lobby.
This assumption stems from the Bishop's conviction, which I respect, that gambling is per se immoral, an assumption which I do not share. Consequently, I have no need for any kind of back door justification of my proposal. And since I do not see casino gambling as wrong, I can hardly be accused of guilt by association in linking it to the funding of the education reforms recommended by the Task Force on Education set up by the Prime Minister.
I have the greatest respect for the findings of the Task Force, many of which emanated from the Policy and Planning Committee of the National Council on Education of which I was chairman.
SHELVING GOOD REPORTS
My concern is that a good report does not get shelved like so many others before it for lack of funds. Hence my suggestion.
I also have the highest regard for the role the churches in Jamaica have played and are playing in the field of education and nothing in my proposal, given my stance on the morality of gambling, could be taken as a "broadside slap in the face of the churches". Bishop Gregory may see it as such but only by imputing motives to me that I do not entertain. In fact my call that proceeds from the lottery companies be diverted from sport to education for a period of ten years was echoing an original suggestion put forward by Monsignor Richard Albert.
MORALLY DANGEROUS CONCEPT
The bishop also takes it for granted that I am a disciple of the school of thought which holds that a good end justifies bad means. Nothing could be further from the truth! I have over the years, in article after article, challenged such a morally dangerous concept, pointing out that when politics is described as the "art of the possible" this reflects a cynicism that puts expediency above principle. If the bishop and I are each to give the other the benefit of sincerely held positions, what ultimately separates us is the theological issue of whether gambling is morally wrong, as he thinks, or whether it is morally neutral, as I believe.
I realise, of course, that I am at a serious disadvantage in trying, as businessman, to argue theology with a bishop. But all through my life I have tried to explore matters of conscience by reading and discussion.
My experience as a businessman, husband and parent has shown me that most human actions produce two effects, one good and the other less desirable. If one refrained from taking action until only an unmitigated good would result, the world would come to a standstill.
In the case of legalised casino gambling, we may assume for the sake of argument that there are two effects, one good, i.e., helping to fund education, and one less desirable, i.e., possible social repercussion. The act of gambling itself is morally neutral.
Individuals may abuse the privilege with tragic individual results as can happen when someone abuses the use of alcohol. But such individual aberrations should not be an excuse for universal prohibition as happened in America when the use of alcohol was made illegal during Prohibition with disastrous results.
Perhaps the anti-casino lobby feels that Jamaicans are not yet as responsible as their counterparts in the developed world to deal maturely with the side effects of gambling. I do not share this view, and in any case would argue that if using the proceeds of gambling to help fund education produces in time a better educated citizenry, the
attraction of gambling might well begin to diminish, thereby lessening the dangers that concern Bishop Gregory.
