Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer
Producer Mikey Bennett started the every third Thursday monthly 'Reasoning With Seasoning'.
WESTERN BUREAU:
THERE WAS a terrible, sad silence in the courtyard of the E-Logic Music Group on Grafton Road in Vineyard Town last Thursday evening, when Carol Lawes asked two young women in the audience to name a woman they admire.
"If we are talking about celebrating women we need to identify some women, in Jamaica or out of Jamaica, who we admire for some reason or another.
One of the two young women, who had been involved in a debate at the latest instalment of 'Reasoning With Seasoning', finally said that there is no woman that they admire in the country. One man named Elise Kelly (radio show host), as 'she is one of the Empress who is holding up the culture'.
Producer Mikey Bennett, who started the every third Thursday monthly 'Reasoning With Seasoning', a mixture of music and interaction on a chosen topic, put forward not a particular woman but said "in every little corner of Jamaica there is the single mother, who gets up before dawn and sweeps the yard, send the children out, make sure the homework is done, all without any steady income and you wonder how she gets it done."
GENERALISATION
"What we are doing sometimes is we tend to generalise like is all teenage girls want money. Nothing could be further from the truth," Bennett said.
That 'truth' was sometimes hotly contested, as although the intention was to celebrate woman, two days after International Women's Day, it veered towards what it takes to be a woman. With Minister of Education Maxine Henry-Wilson in attendance, as well as Elaine Wint-Leslie, the points of view flew thick and fast among a few members of the audience, while most of the others were content to sit and listen, though expressing themselves off-mike.
And much of it centred around a theme that is common in Jamaican music money and relationships between men and women.
One man separated 'deh wid' from a 'relationship', saying "deh is money (from the man to the woman)", while in a relationship "man and woman have joint account, if she want to take $10,000 it is okay, baby".
One of the two young women who would later be unable to name a role model said "the man must do him job, to take care of woman. Woman work hard. She feel the pain and everything."
One deep-voiced gentleman gave his perspective on the matter. "God gave us both organs. She have her organ, me have my organ, so is a 50/50 thing," he said, to appreciative laughter.
The other of the pair of ladies, who had to that point been silent, asserted "me wi tek de money. Me naa open up fi free!"
At this point another young woman admonished her: "You are supposed to be a young lady."
There would eventually be a minor flare-up between the two, the 'money taker' telling the other to shut up, to which the 'young lady' replied "be independent, get a job!".
A STANDARD
Elaine Wint-Leslie calmed the situation, saying "there is something about reasoning that require a bit of respect. It have a standard," she said, telling the woman who had told the other to shut up that an apology was required. It was given with a clarification. "A woman can be working and help out a man, but it don't make sense you just take up a man who have nothing and just lie down with him," she said.
Elaine Wint-Leslie concluded speaking about employment, saying that everyone has a gift. "You have to find it and bring it to fruit," she urged.
