Social anthropologist Dr Herbert Gayle has recommended that Manchester residents collaborate to end extreme inequality, do more to engage young people, and focus on reducing domestic violence to prevent the parish becoming trapped in a vicious cycle of crime and violence.

According to Dr Gayle, 36 per cent of the parish’s residents are living below the poverty line in underserved communities studied by him and his team of researchers. The finding was three times higher than the average for Manchester, despite its significant contribution to the country’s food production.

“Manchester has brutal inequality. However, there is pretence that everyone is in [the] middle class. However, there is no other place like Victoria Town in the parish, where some 70 per cent of the people live below the poverty line. Manchester and St Elizabeth account for more than 50 per cent of the food exports from this country. You should not have that level of poverty and hunger,” he stated.

Dr Gayle was speaking at Golf View Hotel in Mandeville during the third in a series of community security fora staged by the JN Group on March 21. The forum was held under the theme ‘Creating Safer Spaces for your Family’. JN held previous crime fora in May Pen and Savanna-la-Mar earlier this year.

He argued that extreme hunger and poverty, over time, have forced people to develop the mentality of surviving at any cost, which was why the issue of inequality must be addressed before it leads to social upheaval.

“We need to work on the inequality in Manchester,” Dr Gayle stated. “If we want to be safe, let’s give, and give selfishly. There is nothing wrong with being selfish and smart. If I give you $10 because you say you are hungry, I don’t know what my future holds, but that $10 is seed money. Let’s begin the journey of nice selfishness.”

Dr Gayle also advised the audience not to “shut out” young people as many of them are crying out for assistance.

“The shut out of youth is like a time bomb, and we can’t continue to ignore them. Most of us go to church, let us begin our own sermons. We think when we see them with their hand middle green (the act of kneading ganja in the palm in preparation for smoking) it is over, but it is a chance to help them,” he said, adding that there should be a focus on education and creating spaces for youth to have entertainment.

Pointing to domestic violence in Manchester, Dr Gayle said the incidents were too high for a middle-income parish.

“When we ran the wealth of Manchester with the incidents of domestic violence, there were far too many, which means it is a problem. Twenty-two per cent of young persons saw their parents fighting in the communities,” he stated.

Dr Gayle pointed out that in Manchester, 62 per cent of all the violent youth experienced household violence; and 56 per cent who reported joining a gang or crew came from homes with violence. He recommended that to break the cycle of domestic violence, partnerships in the home were necessary.

“Let us also drop the nonsense about patriarchy. Manchester is too patriarchal but with matrifocal realities. Let us help each other and have harmony. I want to hear that the number of domestic violence in Manchester drop. We need to have a safer space and give the poor, hard-working police a break,” he stated.