A Different Direction

In every society there lies challenges, and ours is no different.  How a society firstly identifies those challenges and then deals with it would verily indicate how evolved its leadership and people are. Where then on that intangible sliding scale of progress does ours lie? In answering that an examination of the three variables mentioned would be a good starting point.

1.      

The Challenges:

It has often been said that our Republic is a young one, approaching fifty years in existence. But what happened before, what were the antecedental seeds that were sown over 500 years ago when the Europeans arrived that have grown into a vastly pluralistic, quickly expanding society plagued with so many of the negatives we have come to easily accept and readily dismiss because of tribalism, a tribalism borne out of fear of “them people” and “ is we time now”? So coming up with a list of “to fix now” is as tawdry and exhausting as the problems. The commonality though, is that what normal societies face as routine, becomes exacerbated on an exponential scale here. Through a confluence of circumstance and asystematic decay our very problems have become hinged to our desperate grasping onto our tribalism and resolution inevitably lies in that unhinging. We’ve had the same problems we’ve had for the last 10 years, 20 years and 30 years with only varying degrees of them becoming progressively worse or marginally better. Doesn’t that say something so very loud and pellucidly clear to us all?

So how do we get back to basics, how do we nurture a society of patriots where productivity becomes a universal goal, where maintaining societal discipline is welcomed, encouraged and rewarded, where violence is replaced by mature conflict resolution, where protection of the young, the old, the infirmed, the disaffected, the displaced and abused become duty, where tolerance is not just a watchword but a way of life, where “we time now” is all the time for everyone,  where our schools become the home of our future, where our homes become havens of reflection,  where merit replaces entitlement, where respect accompanies disagreement and finally (but not exclusively) where our leaders become the exemplars of all we aspire to?

Tough questions that require, hard work, unwavering resolve and real leaders of men.  All of which, are embarrassingly short in supply.

2.      

The Leaders:

19^th century German philosopher Albert Sweitzer once said: “Example is not the main thing in influencing others, it is the only thing” and invariably a society becomes a reflection of its leaders and ours is no different. The responsibilities that come with leadership confers onto them the results that come of their leadership and right here the results are a lawless society, corrupted, mismanaged and leveraged to special interests and witless party hacks. Is it not obvious that this cumulating morass of dysfunction is spiraling out of control with each passing year? From a Prime Minister who can’t be believed, to a former one who was chased violently out of his own party’s headquarters, to a President whose social life will ultimately be his legacy, to the country’s biggest businessman living in virtual exile, to the parliament whose upper and lower houses sound like a Sunday morning rum shop lime, to an opposition leader with no party to lead, to two cabinet ministers nearly coming to fisticuffs is it really any surprise that the state of the Republic is more rotten than Hamlet’s Denmark? So how do we solve this crisis of leadership that even pre-dates Dr. Williams? Only the people can do that, how they do that is another matter. To continue along this path could only mean we consent to tribalism and acknowledge that we are accomplices to our bondage to mediocrity.

3.      

The People:

Over 50% of national expenditure is devoted to welfare programs and urban work schemes, yet many deserving and incapacitated citizens fail to benefit from them. We are a hand-out, “eat ah food” society that promotes unproductivity and unreason. With close to half a trillion dollars in expenditure to pass through this country in the last dozen or so years the kind of progress proportional to such expenditure is woefully disproportionate. While our leaders rightfully shoulder some of this burden, the responsibility ultimately lies with all of us. We have been reticent and unmovable in our participation in our democracy. By not consolidating our unitary power to effect the kind of change we want our silence is only broken by our disdain and acrimony to each other because one’s tribe is different than the other. The passion and intensity we devote to disabusing one another erodes every day the power we all hold as a collective to turn around the progress we all want to see.

With little to show where our awareness of the systems of governance, economics and law is concerned what little debate that takes place lacks any cogency, logic and fact. Whereas we unquestionably choose to protest in the name of equally uninformed Trade Union leaders for higher wages and better benefits we refuse to find out the cost involved and how our productivity would affect our outcomes. Not concerned with how our tax dollars are being spent we don’t see protests against ill-advised government projects or poor representation. How can we expect the respect and consideration from our leaders when we don’t respect ourselves, our communities or even our country? Ultimately we are the ones that have them running roughshod over us; we participate in the corrupt practices and legitimize them. We return them to power and sit back, say nothing and defend them. Part of solving our ills lies in showing up, those who don’t, don’t get to take part. We must get our voices heard, provide convincing, rational arguments. We must mobilize peaceably, legitimately and let our patriotic dissenting voices be heard. We must unsheathe that yolk of tribalism and realize our singular allegiance is to this Republic of our birth, demand of our leaders a different path and reject their divisive tactics, rhetoric and actions. Until we decide to come together outside the realm of political partisanship and under a mandate of nationalism we will remain, enslaved to the moribundity of regressive politics and the irrelevant practitioners.

So have we evolved to that point where we could take that next step and move as one into our future positively? We’ll just have to wait and see.

 Edward R. Murrow a pioneer in early television journalism once said:
“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men – not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate, and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.” And whether we choose to follow an unpopular path, knowing and believing in its truth then all will be alright.