Dear Editor,

I just want to say a few things about the runaway crime situation that has now marred our beautiful island. Truth be told, this is not just a Jamaican thing. In fact, it boggles my mind to see that the so aptly called black-on-black violence is a featured characteristic of populations globally that are majority black.

When I read about the latest one out there in St James where a father is alleged to have killed his offspring and then discarded her body, I was left to go into the farthest reaches of my imagination to see if I could fathom how a papa could look in the face of his kid – who probably held his hands while singing a little ditty and swinging around his feet and calling him daddy – could find such evil in his heart.

But he was not the first and certainly won’t be the one to turn the lights off on such a horrendous crime. Frankly, I don’t think ‘black lives matter’ at all, truth be told. Here in Canada, each time you see the faces of my fellow black men on the cover of any newspaper, nine times out of 10 it is for some crime he has committed. Places like Halifax, among other towns, are also reeling from the actions of these miscreants who continue to wreak havoc on their own, causing the communities to live in fear, and giving the police reasons to visit regularly.

The paradox is that there are some of us who can be so great when we put our minds to it.

I believe that if I were in charge of the Government of Trinidad and Tobago I, too, would not want these Jamaicans to come to my country, as the benefits of the good ones are not worth the problems of the bad ones… and they are many.

I am beginning to feel that the future of our group is in jeopardy from among its ranks, and no amount of marching, singing, protesting, begging, bullying, praying, camping out, reparation, and repatriation, etc, can save us. We have been the most ‘jeed up’ and motivated group on planet Earth. We have among our annals great forebears about whom we speak daily. Many of these men and women sacrificed themselves for us as they believed in their hearts that we could, if we were given the opportunity.

Fast-forward to now, and lots of opportunities later to govern ourselves, build our own communities and institutions, and develop ourselves autonomously, and we have failed miserably. I am concluding that black lives don’t matter and only God can save us.

Darolyn Henry-Cross

hdaro36@yahoo.com